


if i gave you a hand to hold, would you take it?

by minweasel



Category: Legacies (TV 2018)
Genre: But Hope does, F/F, F/M, Henelope brotp, Highschool AU, Hope and Josie bestfriends, Josie coming out, Josie doesn't know that she has feelings for Penelope, Mostly Fluff, Posie Endgame, Slow Burn, Very oblivious gays, gay panic!, no powers, not a cheating fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2020-09-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:40:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 21
Words: 32,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25465642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minweasel/pseuds/minweasel
Summary: "I love you."The words rang out in her head. Repeating over and over again. They gave her a sense of happiness that she hadn't felt in a long time, they made her feel whole. But she also felt a foreign sense, it was a relief.__When Rafael told Josie that he loved her, she found herself saying it back despite the fact that she didn't. Something just wasn't right.A certain raven haired girl may have been invading her thoughts and clouding her vision but Josie was - for the time being - utterly clueless.
Relationships: Penelope Park & Josie Saltzman, Penelope Park/Josie Saltzman
Comments: 197
Kudos: 371





	1. I love you too... right?

"I love you."

The words rang out in her head. Repeating over and over again. They gave her a sense of happiness that she hadn't felt in a long time, they made her feel whole. But she also felt a foreign sense, it was relief.

Was that a normal response to someone telling you that they love you? Relief?

She forgot about that for a second and allowed her mind to wander. He loved her. Rafael loved her. But did she love him?

She hadn't been thinking about love. She wasn't assuming that their relationship was just a fling either but she certainly hadn't been thinking about love. She assumed it was just another fun high school relationship.

She wasn't looking for her 'epic love' as Hope liked to call it. If she had found it then that was great, but that wasn't what she went into this whole relationship thing wanting.

The experience was one thing she wanted out of this. Rafael was certainly a great guy, she liked him, she liked spending time with him, cuddling with him, but after all that, even though she hadn't been looking for her epic love, had she found it? Was Rafael it?

No.

"I love you too," she found herself saying. She also found herself being pulled in for a kiss.

They were sitting on a park bench in the middle of town. It was nearing nightfall so there really weren't many people around to watch.

Something didn't sit right in the kiss and she wasn't sure if Rafael could feel it too. Her stomach churned as he went to deepen the kiss but she didn't stop him. He did absolutely nothing wrong, she should have fallen for him like he had fallen for her. So when he pulled away and gave her a bright smile, she returned it. When he reached for her hand, she took it. And when he dropped her off at her front door and leaned in for a kiss, she met him halfway.

It was the perfect highschool romance. Or at least it should have been.

__

When she walked into her living room, Lizzie was on the couch cuddled up with a few pillows and popcorn, watching something on TV. Lizzie heard her come in and paused her show. 

The moment Lizzie turned around and saw her, she could tell something was wrong. Josie didn't exactly look sad, she had a very distinct sad face. But Lizzie could tell something was up because she looked liked someone had just given her a very difficult math problem that she had no idea how to solve.

"What happened?" Lizzie asked, putting her popcorn down and patting the spot on the couch beside her. Josie obliged and cuddled into Lizzie's side, the pillow she had been hugging was forgotten.

"I'll tell you tomorrow," Josie said wearily and Lizzie hummed, "What are you watching?"

"Glee," Lizzie said stuffing some popcorn into her mouth.

"You've watched it like seven times," Josie deadpanned with a fond smile gracing her face, "actually, you HAVE watched it seven times."

"Yeah well," Lizzie said, turning her attention back towards the tv and picking up her remote to press play, "I was feeling it."

Josie just hummed contently. Lizzie played with her hair a little bit and stroked the side of her face. It gave her a good distraction from what had happened earlier that night.

There was too much to think about, like what this meant for her and Rafael's relationship, or why she had even said 'I love you' back in the first place. She just needed to get away from it all. So she let herself fall asleep in Lizzie's lap, her hand still combing through her hair.

The next morning when she woke up, she found a pillow where Lizzie's lap had been and a fluffy blanket covering her.

She looked down towards the coffee table and found a note written in Lizzie's handwriting on a small scrap bit of paper.

It read, 'covering a shift for maya at work, we can talk this afternoon? and i made you pancakes :)'

Lizzie worked at the Mystic Grill and had a tendency to make plans when she had to work, forcing Maya or Ethan to cover for her, so whenever either of them didn't feel like going in, Lizzie always happily obliged in taking their shift for them.

Josie smiled to herself as she got up and walked towards the kitchen and saw a plate of pancakes laid out of the island with a bottle of maple syrup beside it.

As she dived into her breakfast, the memories of last night came rushing back. She groaned loudly and was inwardly glad that her father was out of town for that weekend.

She decided that she had to talk to someone about this, and if Lizzie was occupied, then she could call upon Hope.

She sent a quick message to Hope asking if she was free because she 'needed to rant' and received a quick 'yes' back and was invited over.

Once she finished her breakfast and washed her plate, she went upstairs to get changed and grab a few things. Hope lived just around the block so she decided to walk.

She arrived 5 minutes later and rang the doorbell. A freshly showered Hope opened the door.

"You got here fast," Hope joked but instantly cut herself off upon seeing the distressed look upon Josie's face and immediately changed her tone, "Who do I need to kill?" she asked in a stern tone.

"Nobody," Josie said with a shake of the head, "I just need some help."

Hope opened the door wider and welcomed her in with the wave of a hand.

"Yeah, you said you needed to rant, what happened?"

Josie just shook her head and continued walking through the house until she made her way to Hope's room. This was practically her second home so she didn't bother asking before marching right in. She waited until Hope came in behind her before shutting the door and locking it.

Josie instantly turned back around with wide eyes to face Hope who was utterly bewildered by this situation.

"Rafael told me he loved me," Josie blurted out. 

She watched as about a hundred emotions washed over Hope's face. It went from shock to pity, to annoyance and then to sudden realization which somehow managed to confuse Josie even more than anything else.

Somehow, without Josie even having to tell her, Hope knew that this wasn't what Josie had wanted.

"Did you say it back?" Hope asked, sitting down on the edge of her own bed and staring up at her.

Josie paused for a second. She stopped her pacing back and forth around the room and gave Hope a long and searching look before finally saying, "Yes."

Josie quickly averted her gaze and continued with her pacing. She watched Hope nod out of the corner of her eye and think hard over what she was going to say next.

"Did you mean it?" Hope asked, already knowing the answer but asking anyway because she knew Josie needed to get the words out.

"I don't know," Josie responded quickly as if to dodge the question. Hope watched as Josie's hands slid to her forehead and started to massage her temple like she was deep in thought.

"Well, would you do anything for him?" Hope asked. When she received no response she pushed harder, "Would you... I don't know... die for him the same way you would for me or Lizzie? Or your Dad?"

Josie yet again froze on the spot before giving her answer. 

"No."

Josie stared deep into Hope's eyes and found a soft expression staring back at her, "Well who is it that you would die for?" Hope asked.

Josie understood the translation of that question to mean, 'is there someone else holding you back?'

For some strange reason, even though Josie didn't know the answer herself, she had a feeling that Hope did. The way in which Hope spoke gave her the sense that Hope was insinuating something but Josie had no clue what it was and therefore decided to ignore it.

"I don't know," Josie answered blankly.

Hope nodded again before she stood up and pulled the taller girl down into a strong hug.

While Josie seemed apparently blind to her own situation, Hope was not. Over the years, Hope had watched Josie fall in love with someone in particular without even realizing it. Actually, come to think of it, Hope wasn't even sure if it was the 'who' that Josie hadn't figured out or if it was the entire situation. 'Cause you see, this 'who' was a 'she'.

And this 'who', definitely loved Josie back. Hope knew for a fact that she did because she had told Hope herself. Of course, Hope couldn't tell Josie any of this, it was something the brunette had to figure out herself, and Hope would help her through every step of the way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Let me know what you thought and leave suggestions if you have any!


	2. Who is it that I would die for?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hope helps Josie sort through her emotions and make a plan.

She stayed in Hope's embrace for a full minute before finally pulling away. Hope's smile was soft as she pulled away further and sat down on her bed, leaning against the headboard, patting the spot beside her.

Josie immediately took up her offer and snuggled into Hope's side. Hope knew that Josie was currently overflowing with thoughts - the fact that Josie was already an overthinker didn't help either - and decided to wait until Josie had collected herself. She would let Josie break the silence.

Hope was right, millions of thoughts were running through her head. A million possibilities of what could happen next time she spoke to Rafael, each being quickly discarded one after the other. 

But the one thought that Josie couldn't shake, was the insinuation Hope had made earlier.

'Who is it that you would die for?'

Who was it that she would die for? Really die for? There was Hope and Lizzie of course. There was her father. There was her mother - Caroline - and there was her stepfather - Stephan.

Then there were her best friends. She would die for them too. For Maya and Ethan, Landon, Penelope, MG...

But then there was also the true meaning behind Hope's words which only proved more confusing then if they had been taken literally. 'Who is holding you back?' is what Hope had meant. There was no question in Hope's mind whether or not there was someone holding her back. She knew there was someone but Josie didn't, and now her mind was reeling.

She had all of 3 guy friends excluding Rafael. Landon, MG, and Ethan. Although she may have harbored a crush on Ethan a year ago, that crush had long since faded, and it was clear to anyone with an IQ of above 2 that both Landon and MG's hearts were taken. Landon's by Hope - even though Hope really couldn't care less, and MG's by Lizzie - who may have cared a little more.

So who the bloody hell was Hope talking about? She guessed that she was friendly with both Kaleb and Jed too, but she most certainly didn't have a crush on either of them.

Eventually, Josie found herself content with not knowing. The whole situation was already becoming to confusing so she just decided to forget about the whole thing. Or at least try to.

"What am I supposed to do?" Josie asked once she finally collected all of her thoughts.

"Well for starters, I have to know how you feel," Hope explained, her hands massaging the small of Josie's back, "So you don't love him back right? That's okay. But how far from love are you?"

When Josie just looked up at her blankly, seemingly not understanding what Hope had said, Hope realized she would literally have to spell it out for Josie.

"Do you have feelings for him?"

"I mean I did," Josie said quickly, but Hope just snorted at her feeble attempt to dodge the question and gave her a piercing look, and Josie crumbled beneath it.

What did she feel for him exactly? Take everybody else out of the equation, what did she feel for him? Certainly not love, they had already established that but was it even like? She liked him as a person, he was a great guy. 

So yes, she liked him. But in what way?

She wasn't sure when it had happened, but she knew she didn't have feelings for Rafael anymore. She may have in the past but they never really surpassed 'just feelings'.

"No," Josie said in a firm tone, "I don't."

"Okay..." Hope said in a soft but calculating tone, "Okay, I can work with that."

Josie gave her a questioning look at those words but Hope ignored her.

"So now, you have to break up with him." Hope explained casually as if she were talking about the weather, not breaking off Josie's 7-month relationship with her first-ever boyfriend.

Josie averted her gaze and groaned into the open room.

"No Josie, don't do that," Hope said accusatorially, poking a finger in Josie's stomach, "for once don't think about him, think about yourself. You don't like him, at least not in that way."

Josie still didn't look all that convinced. It wasn't just about her, Rafael loved her and didn't deserve to have his heart crushed.

As though Hope could read her thoughts, she hastened to continue her argument, "I'm not saying you have to break his heart either," she said, "you can let him down easy, besides, staying with him at this point would just be leaning him on."

Josie finally accepted her fate and let Hope pull her back in for a hug.

"When should I do it?" Josie asked, guilt laced in her voice.

"I would say today but it's nearly lunch already so... tomorrow. Later on today, you can message him and tell him that you need to talk."

Josie nodded and smiled into the crook of Hope's neck, "What would I ever do without you?" she drawled sarcastically.

"Honestly I don't know," Hope said, earning her a pillow to the face. 

Hope grunted as she made a move to throw the pillow back at Josie but then Josie's phone rang and the taller girl went to pick it up.

"I finish my shift in 10 minutes, do you want to meet me for lunch at the grill?" Hope heard Lizzie's voice say through the phone.

"Yeah sure, can I bring Hope?" Josie asked, shooting said girl a quick glance.

"Yeah sure," Lizzie said cheerily, "Oh shit! I've got to go, see you in a bit!"

Josie didn't get a chance to say goodbye before Lizzie hung up the phone on the other end.

"Can I use your bathroom before we go?" Josie asked, already on her way to said bathroom and closing the door behind her before Hope could even respond.

Hope chuckled a little at this until she heard the distinct *click* of the bathroom door's lock. Once she was sure that Josie wouldn't come back out for at least a few minutes, she punched her fist up into the air in excitement and barely managed to contain her squeal.

She, Lizzie, Penelope, and even Maya had known for a long time that Josie no longer had feelings for Rafael and that they never really went that deep in the first place. She was positively ecstatic at this new development in - what Lizzie had coined - mission get Josie to stop being a dumbass.

She quickly reached for her phone and went to call Lizzie, knowing that Josie wouldn't be able to hear her from the bathroom.

"What?" Lizzie said rather unkindly as soon as she picked up the phone, "I've got work for another 7 minutes, can it wait?"

Hope didn't even bother acknowledging any of what Lizzie had said as she practically squeaked out, "Josie is going to break up with Raf!"

A part of Lizzie did feel bad for Rafael. He was a great guy and seriously deserved the world, he was one of the only guys at the school that ever came close to deserving Josie, but that didn't stop the excited scream that fell from her mouth.

It was so loud in fact, Hope feared Josie may have heard it and quickly turned down the volume on her phone

"I take it back! Tell me everything!" Lizzie exclaimed.

"I can't, Josie is going to come out of the bathroom soon." Hope explained.

"Why did you even bother calling me then?" Lizzie yelled into the phone. Hope could hear the pout in her voice.

"Well, Your poker face is worse than MG and that's saying something," Hope joked, "I'm pretty sure if I didn't give you any warning you would have given away the entire 'mission get Josie to stop being a dumbass'."

Lizzie laughed at Hope's use of her term for their mission, "Fine, you're off the hook this time but-"

And Hope suddenly hung up the call before Lizzie could even finish her sentence. She figured that Josie must have left the bathroom.

The walk from Hope's house to the Mystic Grill was only ten minutes long so they arrived quickly.

When they found Lizzie at their signature booth in the back of the grill, they both slid in to face her.

"Why do you look so happy?" Josie asked, mildly concerned for Lizzie's wellbeing as the smile covering her twin's face was literally the size of the Joker's and it was a little bit unnerving.

"Just having a good day," Lizzie offered with a shrug of the shoulders.

Once they ordered their food, Josie started to relay the information of last night and this morning to her twin. 

Her twin offered her sympathy, but sometimes, she would see that wide smile grace her sister's face during her rant before being replaced with a flash of pain.

What Josie didn't know was that every time Lizzie looked just a little bit too happy, Hope would kick her from underneath the table. Hard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Leave a comment if you have one, I love reading them!


	3. I just love to hear you talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie and Rafael break up and Josie talks about her breakup with her friends at school the next day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Penelope will finally be making an appearance in this chapter :)

Later that night, Josie sent a message to Rafael asking to talk. He naturally said yes but didn't question what it was about. They agreed to meet for brunch in a little cafe on the outskirts of the center of town.

She was honestly rather nervous because she honestly had no clue what to say. Even when she was talking to Hope, Hope had led the entire conversation.

Josie had never really been very good at expressing her feelings and it wasn't just because she got shy or nervous all the time, even though that did have a little something to do with it. But she never really managed to sort out her emotions in the first place. Without Hope or Lizzie there to talk her through her own feelings, she could never think straight. She was an overthinker.

That was why she didn't really sleep that night. She could have sworn that little rays of sunlight were shining through her window by the time sleep actually came but she wasn't sure.

The next morning she was woken by a pillow to the face. Rather rude in her opinion considering she was sleep deprived.

"Lizzie what the hell!" She exclaimed throwing the pillow right back at Lizzie.

"You should be thanking me!" Lizzie said as she walked over to Josie's closet and started throwing bits and pieces of clothing at her.

As a shirt landed right on Josie's face, she groaned. "Why the hell would I be thanking you?" She asked.

"You're meeting Raf in an hour and I'm pretty sure you would have slept till the afternoon if I didn't wake you," Lizzie explained with a shrug of the shoulders, "Do you want breakfast?"

Josie shook her head and Lizzie left to let Josie get changed.

When Josie left forty-five minutes later, Lizzie hugged her and wished her good luck.

As much as Lizzie knew Josie and Rafael were never really meant for each other, she did know that this would be hard on Josie. She was naturally built to care for others and protect their feelings and she did honestly feel sorry for Rafael but the two never really worked and that was that.

__

When Josie arrived at the little cafe, the moment that Rafael saw her, he knew that this wasn't going to be a very fun conversation. He decided not to stand up and kiss her like he normally would have done.

When she looked around the cafe and spotted him, she gave him a tight-lipped smile before making her way over to him.

They both ordered a coffee and some assorted snacks.

They started with the pleasantries. The 'hello's'. The 'how are you's?'

Then they went into the reason why they were there.

Josie dived into a half planned speech that she had prepared on the way there. She talked about last night first. 

"When you told me you loved me," Josie started, pausing for a second to calm herself down, "I don't know why I said it back. I wasn't planning on lying to you. It just happened. And you looked so happy... I just didn't know what to say... I got confused."

She gave Rafael a second to digest this information. When Rafael gave her a quick nod confirming that he had understood, she continued.

She wasn't going to lie to him, so instead, she was straight to the point. She told him that she didn't have feelings for him. That she didn't know when it happened but at some point, their relationship had reverted back to a friendship.

She said she didn't know why she didn't like him back because he was such a great guy and that he deserved the world.

She said that she hoped they could still be friends, even if he needed time.

Tears had welled up in Rafael's eyes during their entire conversation but the dark-skinned boy wouldn't let them fall. She couldn't really blame him, it was emotional and at times, her eyes had mirrored his.

"It's okay Jo," Rafael said, breaking the silence between them, "You deserve to be happy, even if it's not with me."

 _There it was again_ , she thought. 

'even if it's not with me.'

Why did everybody seem to think that she was secretly in love with someone else? She could very well be reading too far into this but the look on Rafael's face told her that she wasn't.

"I might need some time," Rafael said, pulling her out of her own head, "but I'd like to be friends."

"Yeah," Josie said with a nod of the head, "Me too."

They ended up splitting the bill at the end despite Rafael's protests. _Always the gentleman_ , she thought.

When they parted ways, he hugged her goodbye with tears in his eyes. It went as well as it could have gone, but Rafael wasn't going to get through it without a little bit of heartbreak.

__

The next morning was a Monday meaning she had to wake up at ridiculous o'clock.

She stretched underneath her covers and let out a yawn. With the memories of the weekend flooding back, she wondered whether or not the whole school knew by now. Certainly, her friends would all know, but she doubted that the information had gone beyond her circle of friends.

"You doin' okay?" Lizzie questioned as she sat down for breakfast.

"Yeah," She said and it was an honest answer. She was okay. She felt a little bit off, but she was fine. She was honestly just a little worried about Rafael and whether or not it would be awkward.

But as she sat down in her homeroom that morning, she found that it wasn't awkward at all. She sat between Hope and Rafael like she had done every morning and everything felt completely normal. 

Things felt a little strained in the first few minutes between her and Rafael but by the end, they seemed to be talking like normal, even if he instantly parted ways with her once homeroom had ended. He did say that he would need some time.

Her first class was chemistry which she shared with Hope.

"That went well," Hope said as she too made her way out of homeroom, "all things considered."

"Yeah, I guess so," Josie said in a low spirited tone. But that quickly gave way into a bright smile once she walked into her chemistry class and saw Penelope.

Hope watched Josie's shift in demeanor out of the corner of her eye with a slight smirk before she made her way to the back of the classroom to sit beside Ethan. Josie hadn't even noticed that Hope had left her because she was too caught up in Penelope

They had assigned seating in this class and it just so happened that Josie and Penelope sat together at the front. Offering her a perfect view to watch the show unfold.

She watched as Penelope's face seemed to light up in a similar way Josie's had at the sight of her. 

Hope watched the lingering gazes, the soft and gentle touches that the pair shared, knowing that they carried a lot more than others knew. Hope watched the way Josie would lean into Penelope's touches much more than Hope herself would have. Hope doubted that Penelope would even touch her the way she touched Josie. With such love and care that it should have been obvious to anybody with working eyes that the Penelope was a girl in love. But it turns out, 99% of the students at Mystic Falls High, didn't have working eyes.

Josie just so happened to fit right into that category. That girl was so clueless.

Then a substitute teacher walked in and the two were pulled out of their own little worlds.

Turns out their teacher was sick and they ended up just doing a worksheet. Penelope and Josie worked together on it and managed to get it done with half an hour to spare before class ended.

"So I heard about you and Rafael," Penelope said as if she were testing the waters, "You okay?"

"Well **I'm** fine," Josie said with a shrug of the shoulders, "Rafael... not so much. He took it well though."

"So what exactly happened?" Penelope questioned.

"You mean Hope didn't tell you?" Josie asked, a little surprised. 

In reality, Penelope knew every single detail of their break up. She had stayed up all of last night talking to Hope on the phone about what had happened. She was whipped and she knew it.

"Nope," Penelope said, with an accented pop on the 'p', "Just bits and pieces."

Josie seemed to accept her answer and launched into an explanation. Not that she didn't believe what Hope had told her about the couple's breakup, she just wanted to hear it from Josie.

The cute little frown that Josie wore when she was deep in concentration, the adorable pout her mouth naturally formed into when she reached the more emotional parts of her story and the way her eyes sparkled with passion when she spoke were just added bonuses of hearing it from Josie herself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Let me know if you liked it.  
> __
> 
> The next chapter will see a lot more of Penelope.


	4. I'm the girl in love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hope and Penelope talk about the new developments in Mission: Get Josie to stop being a dumbass. Penelope gets teased a lot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just for the plot's sake, Hope's parents are alive.

The rest of the day went by smoothly. Josie and Penelope shared the following class together too but didn't get a chance to talk. But this didn't stop Penelope from ogling the girl from where she sat in the back of the class.

In their class before lunch, Hope and Penelope decided to partner up for their research task, this gave them the perfect chance to be completely unproductive and spend the entirety of class.

"So what were you guys actually talking about?" Hope asked in a hushed whisper seeing as they were rather close to the front of the classroom. They didn't want anybody to think they were slacking-off now, did they?

"I don't know," Penelope said with a shrug of her shoulders, "I mean we talked about her break up a bit."

"You can't have been talking about that for half an hour!" Hope exclaimed, "What else! I need details! I need to know what I'm working with here!"

"I don't really remember," Penelope shrugged the question off. She was honestly trying to remember what they had talked about but all she was coming up with was Josie's upside-down lips and her chocolate-brown eyes.

"You talked for half an hour and you can't remember a single thing you talked about." Hope deadpanned, scoffing to herself when Penelope blushed and averted her gaze.

Hope just gave her an incredulous look before bursting out with laughter, having to physically cover her mouth with her hand to muffle the sound. The teacher gave them a look but she decided to let it go but not before giving them a pointed look.

"God, you're hopeless! What would you ever do without me?" Hope asked jokingly, grunting in pain when Penelope slapped her arm.

"I never asked for your help with this you know," Penelope mumbled under her breath.

Hope just scoffed, "Uh... I'm pretty sure you did."

"No, actually I didn't!" Penelope exclaimed, "All I did was tell you that I had feelings for Josie, I never said the words 'i need your help,' that was all your own doing."

"Correction, you professed your love for Josie, not that you just 'had feelings for her,'" Hope pointed out, completely ignoring the way that Penelope's face turned bright red, "Second, your helpless pining after her was giving me second-hand heartbreak."

Penelope laughed at that, flashing back to the moment when she had actually told Hope that she loved Josie many, many months ago.

__

_Penelope hadn't even told Hope that she was coming over. She knew that Hope never had anything to do on school nights._

_She all but kicked down the door in an effort to get to Hope. Instead, a very confused Klaus Mikaelson opened the door, giving her an odd look when she muttered a quick hello to him, pushed past him, and walked right to Hope's room._

_He closed the door behind him and his eyes trailed behind Penelope as she made her way into Hope's room. He saw that single-minded determination in her eyes he rarely ever saw there and supposed she had something important to tell Hope._

_She definitely did._

_Her heart was racing and she felt nothing but panic. The realization that had hit her earlier that day had been bugging her all afternoon and she couldn't think of a single other thing._

_Hope screamed when she first saw Penelope storm into her room, putting her hand over her heart in shock._

_"Jesus Penelope!" Hope exclaimed as Penelope shut and locked the door behind her, "A little warning would have been nice!"_

_Penelope, had the decency to look down sheepishly as Hope stood up, "Is something wrong?" Hope asked, her shock giving way to concern for the raven-haired girl. She saw panic and fear in Penelope's eyes._

_"I'm in love with Josie," Penelope blurted out in one breath. Hope's eyes went wide for a split second before pure joy overtook them._

_Hope clapped her hands together and pulled Penelope into a deep hug. Penelope was - to say the least - a little surprised at this reaction._

_"Uh..." Penelope let out after she got over the shock of Hope's sudden embrace._

_"This is amazing news!" Hope said as she pulled away from Penelope, noting Penelope's confusion but deciding to ignore it._

_"How is this good! She has a bloody boyfriend!" Penelope exclaimed._

_"Details, details," Hope waved her hand in the air dismissively._

_Penelope laughed at this before realization hit her._

_"Wait! You knew!" Penelope shouted, "You knew that I- that I... That I like girls?" Her voice fading away towards the end of her question._

_Hope's eyes softened at Penelope's display of nervousness, "Well I knew that you liked Josie," Hope explained, "And considering Josie **is** a girl, I just about managed to put two and two together and figured out you must like girls."_

_The fear and panic left Penelope's face and gave way to a much more relaxed expression._

_"How did you know?" then Penelope changed tact, "Wait no... How long have you known?"_

_"I figured it out a little bit before Josie and Raf started dating," Hope said with a shrug of her shoulders, "But now I think about it, I should have figured it out a lot earlier. How long have you known?"_

_"A few hours," Penelope said sheepishly and Hope laughed as she remembered what they had been doing hours before._

_"You mean when Josie was doing her cheerleading tryout?" Penelope nodded and Hope just laughed louder, "I thought I recognized your deer in headlights look!"_

_Penelope made a move to hit Hope but Hope dodged her and just laughed._

_And that was the day when - although it didn't have this particular name yet - Mission: Get Josie **and** Penelope to stop being dumbasses, was shortened to Mission: Get Josie to stop being a dumbass._

_That was also the day when Penelope was now in on the mission. She blushed profusely when she found out that seemingly everyone but her knew of her feelings towards Josie but was happy at how all of them reacted. Even Lizzie herself said that the two of them were 'endgame' - Lizzie's words, not hers._

__

When she eventually brought herself out of the memory, they actually spent a few minutes doing the work before Hope got bored and started up the conversation again.

"You know, even if she hasn't figured it out herself, she should have at least figured out that you like her," Hope said with a curious tilt to her head.

Penelope slapped her arm again, "You know it's true Peez, you're not exactly subtle," Hope pointed out.

Penelope snorted with laughter, "In my defense, I don't think she's figured it out yet."

"That's because Josie is utterly clueless as to the fact that half the grade has a crush on her," Hope pointed out, "I mean remember that Jade girl who left last year?" Penelope nodded in remembrance, "She was all over Josie and Josie was surprised when we told her that Jade liked her."

"Well to be fair, Jade flirted with everything that moved, Josie wasn't exactly a one-off."

Hope just gave a non-comital shrug of her shoulders, "So she's still clueless?"

"Yup," Penelope confirmed with a sharp nod of her head, "Still completely clueless."

That was when the bell went off and they packed their things.

"I've got to go show this girl whose thinking about going to school here around the campus," Hope explained as they picked up their stuff and left the classroom, "So I won't be at lunch." 

"Okay, see you later then?" Penelope gave her a quick wave as she left her class and Hope returned it.

Either Hope, Lizzie, or Josie normally gave the school tours and today it was Hope's turn.

__

The girl's name was Dani and she was very cute. When Maya saw Hope leading the girl around the school, she decided to join them for that very reason.

Hope lead the girl around the school and pointed out the different classrooms, noting on the different curriculums and the teachers.

They made their way to the cafeteria and Hope pointed out their friend group. Naming a few of them.

"How long have those two been together?" Dani questioned, pointing over to their group of friends sitting together at one of the tables.

"Which two?" Maya asked although she was pretty sure she knew who the girl was talking about. Penelope and Josie were being very touchy-feely.

"Josie and Penelope I think you called them?"

Maya smirked to herself. She was right.

"They... aren't together," Maya said rather unconvincingly.

Dani looked rather surprised as she laughed, "Well then, what the hell is that!?" Dani pointed over to the pair who were completely immersed in the other. Penelope was completely ignoring Landon's attempts to get her attention about god knows what.

Maya laughed at that, "Two complete and utter idiots."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know what you thought!
> 
> And just letting you know, I didn't get a chance to finish the next chapter in time to release it today, so it'll be a day late :)


	5. I'm in the corner, watching you kiss her...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lil splash of Jealous Josie since you asked so kindly :)
> 
> Also, so sorry for the late update, I stayed with friends the last two nights and didn't get to do any writing.

The next few weeks went by without anything eventful happening in their mission.

The spring formal was coming up and neither Josie nor Penelope had a date. Their initial plan was to get them to dance but they thought that it would probably confuse Josie rather than help her.

So they decided that they were going to have to pull out the big guns. Jealousy. Penelope of course had no idea of their plan.

The group; Maya, Hope, Lizzie, Josie, and Penelope decided to get ready together at the twin's place. Lizzie was going with MG, and Maya was going with that new girl, Dani. That left Hope to shepherd the 'will they, won't they' couple and initiate the next phase in their mission.

While Lizzie spent the whole time stressing over what MG was going to wear and whether or not it would fit with what she was wearing, the rest of them actually did their makeup and got ready.

Hope did Maya's makeup, sitting by Lizzie's desk and Penelope did Josie's sitting by Josie's desk. When Penelope finished Josie's makeup, she stood up and stretched before flopping down on Josie's bed.

Just as she was about to get up to let Josie do her makeup, she let out a little squeak of surprise and flushed bright red.

Josie was now straddling her on her bed, holding a makeup brush to her face.

Hope and Maya managed to contain their laughter at Penelope's face with a massive effort. Lizzie, on the other hand, didn't fare so well and broke into a fit of laughter which she somehow managed to pass off as a coughing fit when Josie turned around and gave her a look.

Penelope was completely flustered. She tried to form a sentence or maybe even a word but she came up short. Her throat felt oddly dry and her breath was coming out ragged and uneven. Josie didn't seem to notice whatsoever.

"Close your eyes," Josie ordered in a soft voice. It was such a contrast to the look that she had just thrown Lizzie that it caught Penelope off guard and all she could do was obey.

As Penelope closed her eyes, the last thing she saw was Josie's smug grin and Maya sending her a wink out of the corner of her eye. She knew they would no doubt make fun of her to no end about this tomorrow or maybe even in a few hours at the dance, but to be honest, at this moment, she couldn't find a single fuck to give.

The whole world went silent as all she could feel was Josie's soft and delicate hands. She lost herself in the touch and didn't realize how long she had been lying there until Josie pulled away from her hands.

"All done," Josie said proudly as Penelope opened her eyes. Josie's eyes were blown wide with affection and Penelope was sure hers were too. They stared for god knows how long until Penelope caught herself and looked away, encouraging Josie to do the same.

Josie stood up and wiped down her skirt, straightening it. Penelope on the other hand nearly fell over when she stood up, her knees going so weak that she decided to just sit on the edge of the bed and wait for the others to finish.

__

Lizzie was picked up by MG and Maya left to go pick up Dani. That left the rest of them being driven by Caroline who had just come back from her business trip across the state.

Penelope managed to get shotgun while Hope sat with Josie in the back. Meaningless conversation flowed easily between the four of them, Penelope and Hope were practically family at this point. They had known each other since early primary school.

As they arrived and Hope and Josie got out of the car, Penelope made a move to follow but found her door to be locked. Penelope turned around to Caroline, about to ask her to open it when she found a smug grin on the blonde's face.

Caroline waved Hope and Josie off to the dance and then reverted her attention back to Penelope.

"So Penelope," Caroline started in a sarcastic tone.

"Caroline," Penelope drawled in an equally sarcastic voice, knowing by now that Caroline hated being addressed by her last name.

"What's going on between you and Josie?"

The question caught her off guard because there really was nothing going on between the two, but she blushed none the less.

"Nothing," Penelope said, averting her gaze from Caroline's fierce one.

Caroline burst out into laughter, "Lizzie filled me in on the details, I just wanted to say good luck," that caught Penelope even more off guard, as did the genuine tone in which Caroline said it, "You two make a good pair, I'm rooting for you."

Penelope's face controlled into a goofy grin, "Thank you."

"But..." Caroline drawled, her tone now serious, "I feel like if I didn't at least threaten you a little bit, I wouldn't be fulfilling my role as a mother."

Penelope gulped audibly.

"If you break her heart, or hurt her in any way, I will kill you. Slowly," Caroline emphasise the last word and gave her a very stern look.

Penelope nodded very quickly, "Of course, but you know I would never hurt her."

Caroline nodded in agreement, "I know, but you can never be too careful."

And as mortifying as that conversation was, Penelope couldn't help but laugh as she made her way into the dance and thought back on it.

She hadn't realized how long she had been talking with Caroline until she walked in and found the dance to be in full swing.

She walked around the outskirts of the gym, attempting to find one of her friends at one of the tables but when she found no one, she figured that they must be dancing. The crowd was so tight together that Penelope couldn't make out a single one of them.

She waited for a few minutes by the drinks until the song ended. She was still looking into the crowd, hoping one of her friends would appear when a figure materialized out of nowhere right beside her.

"I need a drink," the figure exclaimed with a breathy tone.

Penelope looked up to the figure and found a beautiful, face flushed with red and exhaustion, Josie who completely missed the fact that she had quite literally rendered Penelope speechless.

"What did my Mom want?" Josie inquired, leaning on the table to give Penelope her full attention. Penelope stayed silent, she hadn't even noticed that Josie had said anything despite the fact that she saw her mouth move. Penelope just stood there staring.

"Hello?" Josie waved a hand to Penelope's face when it became clear that the shorter girl wasn't going to respond, "Earth to Penelope!"

This managed to pull her out of her daze. "Huh?" She looked up a little and finally met Josie's eyes.

"What did my Mom want?" Josie asked her again, the smirk present in her voice.

On top of the fact that Penelope was standing before a breathtakingly beautiful Josie, she was now faced with trying to explain that Caroline had both given her consent to date Josie and given her the shovel talk when they were nowhere near that phase in the mission. A mission that Josie didn't know existed.

Penelope was saved from trying to answer by everybody else showing up and grabbing drinks. They all said their hello's to her, but Maya and Hope walked right up to her and dragged her away.

"Okay, so in about 30 seconds, Ethan is going to ask you to dance," Maya said before Penelope could get a single word out. 

Penelope's eyes went wide, but before she could interject, Hope spoke up. 

"And you're going to say yes," Hope said in a stern tone.

Penelope dragged them away from the group a little further before finally getting a word in and speaking in a hurried whisper, "I will do no such thing!"

"Don't worry, he doesn't like you like that," Maya hurried to explain, "It's all part of the plan," as if that explained a single god-dam thing.

"What Plan!?" Penelope yelled, gaining the attention of the rest of their friends over by the drinks. Hope waved off their inquiries.

"Just go with it," Hope said before pushing her into her pack of friends.

The instant she arrived, sure enough, Ethan walked up to her.

"May I have this dance?" He asked, surprising not only her but most people standing in their little circle. She saw Landon's eyes go wide and MG's jaw hit the floor. She also saw Maya give her a glare that scared her.

"Sure," She said hurriedly, taking his hand and giving him a kind smile. As the pair walked off, Penelope saw Hope and Maya hi-five behind the rest of the group out of the corner of her eye. She also swore she could see a slight look of discomfort on Josie's face.

As they walked into the midst of the dancing couples, they swayed together easily enough. They were close friends and were quite comfortable together.

"What exactly is in this for you?" Penelope asked curiously.

"Other than knowing that I had a hand in finally getting you and Josie together," He said with a mischievous tone to his voice, "Maya owing me a favor."

"You know!?" She blurted out with a panic-stricken voice, "Did Maya tell you?"

"No, Maya didn't tell me. I do have eyes you know," he said giving her a winning smile, "You're not exactly the most subtle person."

She shook her head at his antics, a smile present on her face before they went back to dancing, just swaying to the music.

Josie however was not smiling. Her eyes were transfixed on the couple before her. Since when had Ethan liked Penelope!? She was sure Maya would have told her. She would ask Maya about it if she could tear her eyes away from the dance floor.

She could feel something unpleasant in her stomach. Something just wasn't right. She felt it building up inside her. Like a monster clawing at her insides. 

She didn't know what this feeling was and she didn't like it.

Looking at Penelope and Ethan was physically hurting her and she had absolutely no idea why. Penelope looked happy. She was smiling at the things Ethan was saying and laughing at his jokes. She wanted Penelope to be happy, she wanted her friend to be happy and Ethan was certainly an excellent guy. So why the hell did she feel like ripping him limb from limb?

Her head was so full of thoughts that she didn't even notice Lizzie, Maya, and Hope studying her closely from behind.

"Do you think she's figured it out?" Maya questioned in a hushed whisper.

"No, but I think she's getting there," Lizzie said in a calculated tone, "I think she just needs a few pokes in the right direction."

"Do you think she'll ask you about it?" Maya questioned in a curious tone.

"Me? No. Hope? More likely," Lizzie explained, "She goes to Hope to try and sort out her feelings and then tells me after."

Maya nodded in understanding.

"So if she hasn't figured it out after tonight and after talking to one of us, what's next?" Hope inquired, looking right up at Lizzie.

"Well, Josie and Penelope's relationship is rooted so deeply in friendship that right now it's all Josie can see. She has never even considered the possibility that she could like Penelope or that Penelope could like her. But you know we can't just tell her straight up, this is something she needs to figure out on her own."

"So, now that she is trying to figure out her feelings, we can just give a few gentle nudges in the right direction. It's like every friend to lovers' story ever. You know one day, you look at the person and you see something more than you did the night before. Like a switch has been flicked somewhere. We need to flick that switch in Josie's mind."

Hope and Maya stared up in awe at Lizzie. Hope was starting to wonder if that speech had been prepared when Maya asked, "How exactly do we go about doing that?"

"I mean I don't know if we can actually influence what happens next. Maybe it just has to happen of its own accord. Maybe she has to do it by herself," Lizzie paused, a smirk evident on her face, "But... I do have a few ideas that might work, or at least push her in the right direction."

She had a few ideas alright. Ideas that Penelope certainly would not like but she would find very, very entertaining.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Let me know what you thought! Also, if you have any ideas for what Lizzie's plan could be to flick Josie's switch that you would like to see me write, leave me a comment.


	6. How far would one go for love?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lizzie's plan...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the comments, I really appreciate them, they keep me going :)

Lizzie's statement of having a few ideas scared Hope and Maya. When Lizzie wanted something done - in this case, getting Penelope and Josie together - it would happen, no matter the methods she had to use. So this would certainly be interesting.

They thought that Lizzie might elaborate on her plan but apparently not. Lizzie just continued to look between Ethan and Penelope on the dance floor and Josie standing as still as a statue, glaring at the pair with a look of severe confusion.

Maya and Hope share a look, the silent question of 'do I want to know?' passes between them.

When the song ends and is replaced by a faster one, Lizzie and Hope quite literally pull Josie to the dance floor while Maya went off with Dani.

Josie took quite a bit longer to get into it than usual, only properly losing herself in the song when they had moved a little and could no longer see Ethan and Penelope dancing.

__

"No. Nope. Definitely not!" Penelope exclaimed the following afternoon when Lizzie thrust an outfit into her lap, "I am not wearing that!"

Lizzie was right. Penelope certainly did not like her idea.

Penelope threw Hope and Maya a pleading look but they both just shrugged, although Hope did look the slightest bit apologetic. Apparently they liked this little idea. Lizzie had filled them in the morning after the spring dance.

"Oh come on, you know you would look good in it," Lizzie pointed out, putting a hand to the outfit in Penelope's lap to stop her from throwing it back to her, "and you know you would get attention wearing it."

"Yeah, not the kind that I want!" Penelope yelled exasperated, knowing that she had already lost this argument, "I'd never wear this in the first place, especially not to school!"

At least that was true. The short shorts were about three times shorter than the ones that she would usually wear and the crop top was barely anything more than a bra.

"I don't know P, I've seen your closet, this isn't really too far off," Maya pointed out insinuatingly.

"The style? Maybe. The amount of skin that I would be showing? Hell no!" But she was already standing up and walking towards her bathroom to get changed into it.

She stared back at herself in the mirror once she had changed. She had to give Lizzie some credit, she did look good. But she looked more like she was about to head to a college party than walk into a high school. Maybe there were a couple of students who dressed like this, but never her!

As she walked out of the bathroom, she felt three pairs of eyes practically bare into her soul. They all wore pleased expressions and Lizzie gave her an appreciative nod of the head.

"What did I tell you?" Lizzie asked, "You look amazing!"

"I look like a hooker." Penelope deadpanned, and Lizzie just scoffed, raising one eyebrow, "Okay I might be exaggerating a little but I'm not that far off! At this point, why don't I just show up in a bikini."

Lizzie's eyes seemed to light up at the idea, and Penelope hastened to backtrack, "That was a joke, Lizzie! I am not wearing a bikini to school!"

Maya let out a snort at the way Penelope's eyes went wide. Penelope glared in her direction but Maya didn't look the slightest bit sorry and just shrugged.

"Why did I ever let you guys help me with this in the first place?" Penelope muttered under her breath as she grabbed the next outfit that Lizzie had laid out for her and made her way back to the bathroom.

"Because you need it!" Lizzie yelled out from behind her. 

Penelope just flipped her off before slamming the bathroom door behind her, earning a few laughs from Maya and Hope.

If she had a little more of a backbone then she may have been able to get herself out of this situation, but realistically, nobody ever won an argument against Lizzie unless she wanted you to. And that always turned out worse than if you had lost the argument in the first place. 

__

When she walked into school on Monday, she regretted her decision to go along with Lizzie's plan. The second she walked through the school doors, heads turned in her direction and everybody went silent. It was like a scene from a movie.

She saw a few jaws drop and many eyes widen. She felt Hope - who had driven her to school - give her a little nudge in the back and she finally started walking through the halls.

Penelope knew that she was attractive to some degree, but apparently, before today, nobody else had known it. People just never really paid attention to her the way they paid attention to some of the other students. 

Perhaps it was because she went out of her way not to get **that** kind of attention. 

Actually, that was definitely why. Because the moment people started looking, they couldn't tear their eyes away. The moment they finally saw her in that way, she was all anybody would talk about. And although she had never been looked at this way, and it did make her the mildest bit self-conscious, it did give her just the slightest ego boost.

But all of it, every stare and every whisper was worth it when she saw the look on Josie's face as she walked into her history class.

She sat down beside Josie like she did every class, and acted like normal. She grinned to herself, pleased that she could have this effect on Josie even if Josie still hadn't gotten her feelings in order.

They sat there for a good ten seconds before Josie managed to pull herself together.

"Hi," Josie said with a little shake of her head, fighting a silent battle to keep her eyes trained on Penelope's face and off of her body. Somehow, Penelope's smile widened even further at the way Josie's eyes were forcefully trained on her own.

She went on like that for a full week, going through 5 different outfits all chosen by Lizzie. She wasn't even sure where Lizzie had gotten the clothes because they couldn't have been her own, Lizzie was much taller than her. And it was most definitely not Josie's either because Josie would never dress the way she was dressing. 

This left Penelope wondering if Lizzie had actually bought her these outfits. She would pay Lizzie back for them but this was all her idea in the first place so she decided that she didn't have to.

__

On Friday afternoon, Penelope, Hope, and Maya all came over to the twin's house again. Josie was in the living room working on finishing a paper that she had got an extension on until 7 pm, leaving the four of them to themselves.

Penelope's phone buzzed from across the room and she went to check it while Maya went into a rant about Dani. When she checked her message, she was surprised to find one from Kym, Kaleb's sister.

Admittedly they were friends, but they weren't close and Penelope had no clue why the girl would be messaging her.

"What is it?" Hope asked, noting the confusion on Penelope's face.

She ignored Hope's question and she opened the message. Her eyes practically popped out of her head when she read the message.

Apparently, by dressing the way she had done, she had gotten the attention of the wrong girl. Kym was asking her out on a date.

"What is it?" Hope repeated when Penelope didn't answer her.

She tore her eyes away from her phone and stared up at the three girls.

"Kym just asked me out," Penelope said, her voice laced with both shock and confusion.

She watched as their expressions quickly mirrored hers, their eyes widening comically. That had certainly not been a part of the plan. They stared at each other blankly for a good minute before Penelope finally spoke up.

"What am I supposed to do?" she asked, genuinely quite lost here. 

Maya and Hope looked just as lost as she did. Lizzie however, looked like Christmas had come early for her. 

Her eyes lit up and Penelope recognized that face. Lizzie had an idea. Maya and Hope seemed to recognize the face too and turned to give Lizzie their full attention, wondering what she had in mind this time. But Penelope's mind was working faster than theirs and had put two and two together. In an instant, she decided that she liked this idea of Lizzie's even worse than her last one.

"No. No. No. No," Penelope repeated like a mantra, shaking her head, "I am not saying yes."

But Lizzie's smile only widened, the mischievous glint in her eye even more evident than it was before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Let me know what you thought and let me know if you have any ideas!
> 
> (By the way, the point of this isn't to lead Kym on or anything like that)


	7. Is this love that I feel?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lizzie, Hope, and Maya try to talk Penelope into going on the date.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay!

Lizzie's smile only widened. It was getting creepy at this point, she could give joker a run for their money.

"Yes, you will!" Lizzie exclaimed, "This is perfect! It's just what we need!"

You could practically see the cogs turning in Lizzie's head, she was scheming and it was scary.

"You know what?" Penelope said hopefully, looking down at her phone, "Maybe she just meant that she wanted to hang out."

Maya raised an eyebrow before lunging towards Penelope. Penelope squealed in fright and Maya snatched her phone from her, opening up the text and reading it out loud.

"Hey," Maya read with an insinuating tone, "do you maybe wanna hang out sometime? That means a date, Penelope. I mean I know you're kinda lacking in the relationship department but I didn't think you were this dim."

"I am not dim!" Penelope exclaimed defensively, "You read it! She said do you wanna hang out! I could have just been reading into it."

"She said 'do you maybe wanna hang out sometime' not 'do you wanna hang out'. They are two very different things," Lizzie explained casually, eyeing her nail polish and seemingly unbothered by Penelope's outburst. Maya snorted in laughter at the look that Penelope shot Lizzie.

"You know she does have a point," Hope said, trying to calm Penelope down a little. It didn't work judging by the look that Penelope now gave Hope instead of Lizzie.

"Even if she did," Penelope said sternly, "I'm not going to lead Kym on like that!"

"Listen, Penelope," Lizzie said in a soft voice, a large contrast to the sarcasm in her voice just seconds earlier, "This doesn't just have to be to get my clueless sister's attention."

At this Penelope just got even more confused. She could have sworn she heard Lizzie mutter something about 'having to do all the work around here' under her breath.

"Let me spell it out for you," Maya said, guessing that Penelope may have been getting a little fed up with Lizzie at this point, "A pretty girl just asked you on a date. A casual date, that's all it is. And the girl that you like, is still trying to sort out her feelings. So in the meantime, why not try something new?"

"If you said yes," Hope drawled, taking over for Maya, "it's not just to make Josie jealous. Just take her away from the equation."

Penelope thought it over for a while. She hated to admit it, but they were right. Josie was still a while off from figuring herself out so why not try this in the meantime? Aren't high school relationships all about the experience?

And on the bright side, this would put an end to all of the outfits that Lizzie had been making her wear to school.

"Fine," Penelope said begrudgingly. She saw Maya tying something on her phone and immediately lunged for it but she was too late.

"You have a date on Sunday," Maya said with a smirk on her face, "I hope you're free."

It was at this moment, as Penelope made a move to hit Maya and Hope luged at Penelope to hold her down, that Josie decided to walk into the room. The second they heard the door creak open they froze and looked up to Josie's stunned figure. Penelope went slack and Hope finally managed to tear her away from a victorious looking Maya.

"What the fuck did I miss?" Josie questioned, a bemused look on her face. It was a rare occurrence for Josie to swear and it only really happened when she was joking, it was impossible for anybody to keep a straight face if Josie swore when she was angry. She just looked like a kicked puppy and far too adorable.

"Penelope has a date!" Lizzie, Hope, and Maya all blurted out simultaneously as if that explained their current position. But Josie forgot about all that the second she heard the words that came from the girl's mouths.

Her jaw dropped and her eyes zoned in on Penelope. For a second, Penelope could swear that the look that overcame Josie's face was pure defeat. But the second she thought that she recognized the look, it was gone and gave way to confusion as Josie visibly tried to pull her thoughts together.

Josie's mind was a complete and utter mess. She simply couldn't understand what was going on. She tried to focus on Penelope and her happiness - her best friend's happiness - but she simply couldn't.

She felt crushed and she felt empty to the point where it physically hurt. She felt that - now-familiar - unpleasant monster clawing at her insides once more, just like how it had done at the dance. She still didn't know what the feeling was and she still did not like it.

It wasn't like she was jealous or anything. She didn't have any issue with sharing Penelope, she already shared her with Hope, Lizzie, and Maya.

She hated herself for whatever it was that she was feeling because she wanted so desperately to feel happy for Penelope and just couldn't figure out why she didn't. It was all too confusing so she gave up on trying to figure it out. Instead, she gave Penelope a winning - and completely fake - smile.

"That's amazing Penelope," She said, hoping that her voice didn't sound too strained. Penelope gave her a tight-lipped smile and nodded her head awkwardly.

"Thanks," She managed to get out.

She saw the three girls behind her exchange a look full of meaning. It may have been a worry, or maybe understanding? Penelope couldn't quite decipher it but there was something there.

"How did your essay go?" Hope asked, deciding a change of conversation was in order.

The rest of the night was full of tension. Penelope and Josie could never quite meet each other's eyes which was a stark change to their normal behavior considering that they were normally very touchy-feely. 

Penelope felt like she was walking on eggshells around the girl because she truly had no clue what was going on in her head. Penelope may be able to read Josie's emotions because she wore them on her sleeves, but she couldn't read her thoughts and that was terrifying.

She felt like Josie was so close yet so far from understanding it all. 

__

When Josie woke up and checked the clock, she found it to be three AM. She groaned to herself and tried to go back to sleep. She was getting quite close to doing so until she rolled over and felt something holding her back.

That was when she felt Penelope's hand in hers, apparently, they had fallen asleep holding hands. This wasn't uncommon for the pair so it didn't bother her. It also wasn't uncommon for the two of them to share a bed.

But the second she felt Penelope there beside her, the memories of the previous night came rushing back to her and any hope of sleep went right out the window.

She lay there deep in thought for at least an hour.

All she felt was doubt and she didn't like that. She was always so sure of everything that she did so what she was feeling now was completely unnerving.

She went over everything in her head and just felt like she was going in circles. Her mind was a maze and every time she tried to come up with an explanation for the way that she felt, she hit a dead end and had to backtrack.

She felt like the answer was right on the tip of her tongue and she just couldn't quite get there. It was like a childhood memory trying to resurface, she just couldn't quite get it.

Apparently she had been lying there for longer than she thought because she could see light poking through the breaks in the curtains. Just enough to illuminate the side of Penelope's face that was facing up.

The whole time Josie had laid there, she made no move to take her hand away from Penelope's. Not because she was scared of waking her but because it gave her comfort. It was just as good as having Penelope's arms wrapped around her in a tight hug. It was in those arms that she felt safe, so with her hand in Penelope's, she felt as such.

As the light hit Penelope, Josie looked over at her in admiration. Penelope looked so effortlessly beautiful and yet so peacefully that it was borderline annoying. Josie put effort into how she looked and Penelope didn't seem to care at all. She had always felt a little self-conscious about it but then Penelope would look at her like she hung the stars and suddenly all her worries would fade away.

What she felt with Penelope was what she imagined love to feel like, if only Josie realized how close to the mark she was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Josie is so clueless it's kind of painful. But don't worry, she's gonna figure it out very soon!  
> __
> 
> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know your thoughts. I'm really sorry for the delay again, I've been busy getting ready to start school again soon and I'm just trying to sort everything out, hopefully, I should be back to daily updates soon.
> 
> also, I made a new Twitter, if u wanna follow/talk to me there, its: @minweasel_id


	8. Like a switch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Penelope goes on her date and Josie is definitely not jealous.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the shorter chapter.

Penelope and Kym organized to have lunch at a diner near town and since Kym was the one that asked her out, she picked up Penelope.

The drive was about 20 minutes long and was nowhere near as awkward as she thought it might have been. The moment they got in, Kym started blasting her music and they had surprisingly similar tastes.

Conversation flowed easily between them as did witty banter. They had never really talked like this before so it was a little odd but Kym seemed like an amazing person. She was funny, she was smart, she was kind, she could take a joke and she was very pretty.

They ordered their meals and everything was going smoothly. Penelope honestly didn't know why she had never become friends with Kym, they had known each other for years but never properly interacted which was strange seeing as Penelope was friends with Kaleb - Kym's brother.

They had a lot of shared interests too. other than their similar music taste, they both loved softball, they both hated football, they both loved English and they both thought that Miss Mystic Falls was misogynistic and archaic.

The date was perfect. Kym was perfect. It should have been perfect. But there was one slight issue. Because as much as she wanted it to work, she was in love with Josie. As much as she wanted to listen to Maya, Hope, and Lizzie, she couldn't help but feel like she was leading Kym on, even if this was just a casual date.

Kym took it well enough, she said that she just wanted to 'shoot her shot', said that any guy or girl would be lucky to be with Penelope. So they agreed to be friends. 

And even with all that, the drive back to Penelope's house still wasn't awkward. There was a little bit of tension between the two of them but they got past it. She seriously thought they would work as friends.

__

Penelope didn't get a chance to update her friends on the date and didn't share any classes with any of them on Monday before lunch, so when she sat down at their regular table, she was bombarded with questions.

Penelope's head pounded and she cringed at the fact that Kym was only a few tables away and may be able to hear them.

"Calm down, Calm down," Penelope hushed them with a wave of her hands.

"Calm down!?" Lizzie exclaimed, "What do you mean calm down! You didn't answer any of my messages or Maya's or Hope's!"

Penelope didn't miss the fact Josie was not paying attention to the conversation and looked like she would rather be anywhere else. She looked rather dull.

"I didn't get around to it, I thought I could just tell you today," Penelope said with a sheepish shrug of her shoulders, realizing that she probably should have at least messaged Lizzie back. Lizzie liked to be on top of everything and always wanted to be two steps ahead. Not messaging her back meant that Lizzie had no plan and Lizzie didn't like not having a plan.

"Well?" Hope pushed, "What happened?"

"It was nice and fun but we work better as friends," Penelope explained, clearly wanting a change of topic. 

At this information, Maya and Hope nodded their understanding but wore matching smirks, knowing that there was definitely more to it that Penelope couldn't really say with Josie at the table. Lizzie on the other hand wore a calculated look, trying to figure out what their next step should be. But Penelope's eyes weren't on her. Her eyes were on Josie.

Josie was apparently still tuning in to their conversation because, at the news, she brightened. Her smile seemed less forced, her shoulders less hunched and her whole demeanor more relaxed.

Josie had been in her head the entire weekend. She had refused to talk to anybody because she had been thinking everything over. She felt so close to figuring out, like she was nearly there, just not quite.

With Josie back to her normal self, the tension present at the table completely vanished. They moved on to talking about their homework and the new boy 'Sebastion' with whom Lizzie was utterly smitten.

__

At the end of the day, they had planned to go to the Mystic Grill, but when Hope and Josie got detention for being too noisy in class, Maya and Lizzie ditched. Penelope however, waited behind. 

Because she had no work to catch up on, she decided to head to the school's gym. She didn't go often but she had time to kill and nothing else to do so she just went for it. She headed straight for the treadmill and ran for a good half hour, losing herself in the music after messaging Hope to tell her where she was.

When she looked up at the clock and saw that Hope and Josie would be out of detention in around ten minutes, she got off to stretch. The moment she saw the pair walk in, she headed right for them.

"I need water," Penelope panted out as she reached them, grabbing a cup and heading towards the water dispenser, pushing past Josie to do so.

Hope followed her but Josie froze where she was. Hope and Penelope struck up a conversation and didn't notice Josie's odd behavior, an odd recreation of when Josie had gotten punch from where Penelope was standing at the dance and had unknowingly left the girl breathless.

It was like a switch had been flicked in her mind. How could she not have seen it before?

She liked Penelope. 

No.

That wasn't right.

She loved Penelope.

As in she was in love with Penelope.

She didn't know what it was about the moment that got her brain to finally catch up to her feelings but it finally did. 

Maybe it was how hot and bothered Penelope looked. Maybe it was the red tint to her cheeks and the tiny sweat droplets at the sides of her face and on the tip of her nose. Maybe it had something to do with the black leggings that Penelope wore combined with a hot pink sports bra. Maybe it was the fact that Penelope completely missed the flustered look on Josie's face when she had brushed passed her.

Either way, at this moment, the why and the how she finally figured it out didn't matter. About a million thoughts were rushing through her head so to try and sort them out, she had to push a few to the back and completely ignore them.

She felt like she had simultaneously been standing there frozen for a single second and standing there for an entire Millenium.

Both Penelope and Maya and maybe even Hope were into girls to Josie had no clue why the thought of her possibly liking them too had never crossed her mind. 

Perhaps it was why she figured it out so late because the more she looked back on it, the more obvious it seemed. The jealousy she had felt towards Kym, the way her heart fluttered in her chest whenever Penelope combed her fingers through her hair, the way a monster seemed to claw at her insides when she stood there frozen, watching Penelope dance with Ethan.

Thus far, her only thoughts had been of relief. All she had been thinking of for the last few days, maybe even weeks was why she was feeling the way she was feeling. So all she felt now was a certain sense of accomplishment at finally putting two and two together.

But then the panic set in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh the panic phase. I guess this is kind of Josie's 'oh shit' moment.  
> __
> 
> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know you're thoughts!


	9. Love made me stupid... and a mess

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie struggles to act normal with her newfound feelings for Penelope.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay!

At this moment, the only coherent thought that was going through her head was 'oh shit!'. 

Her heart was pounding in her chest so loudly that she was surprised neither Penelope nor Hope had heard it yet. She half expected one of them to call an ambulance.

She had spent so long trying to figure out what was going on in her head, but now she knew, now that the switch had been flipped, she half wanted to flip it back. She half wished that she hadn't finally figured it out because now she had no idea what she was supposed to do with the information.

Did Penelope like her too? Or were her feelings one-sided? Was she supposed to tell Penelope how she felt? Did she even want to tell her? Just because she had feelings for Penelope didn't mean that they should automatically be together right? Or that she would even want to be with Penelope.

Okay, scratch that. 

She did want to be with Penelope.

But how the hell was she supposed to process this information?

And worst of all, she was still in the same room as Penelope and was supposed to be hanging out with her for the next few hours.

So she decided to do what she does best. Ignore.

"Josie," Penelope called from the water fountain, "Josie are you okay?"

Penelope's voice sounded simultaneously as though she was hearing it from underwater and the clearest she had ever heard it.

"Yeah," Josie said snapping out of her daze, "Yeah I'm fine."

Because really there was nothing wrong with her. Nothing had happened other than she had just been hit with the information that she is indeed in love with her best friend.

"You sure? You seem a little out of it," Penelope pointed out, finally walking up to her.

Now that Josie had a direct view of Penelope, she wondered yet again why it had taken her so long to figure it out. Looking at Penelope now it was obvious. How could she not love her?

Penelope was standing before her, giving her a concerned look before sending Hope a questioning one. Hope just shrugged because Josie had been fine in detention just mere minutes ago.

"No, I'm fine," Josie shrugged off, her voice a bit too high-pitched to be convincing, "I just remembered an essay I need to finish for English."

"Oh okay..." Penelope said, her face contorted in confusion as Josie turned around and started walking out.

"We don't have an essay in Engli-" Hope started but stopped when she saw the death glare that Josie shot her on her way out the door.

Penelope widened her eyes in surprise at the fact that Josie quite literally just strutted out of the room to avoid whatever conversation they had been having. Most of the time, Josie talked out her problems but apparently now was not one of those times.

Hope and Penelope looked at each other with matching looks of 'should we go after her?' 'Are we supposed to do something about this?' and 'What the fuck!?'

They stood there silent for a second until Josie popped her head around the corner, "Are you guys coming or what?" She asked with confidence she did not possess.

Hope and Penelope unfroze and rushed to catch up with her.

It was a quick walk to the Mystic Grill, only 5 minutes long but Josie thought she was going to lose her mind because she was walking to the right of Penelope and their hands kept brushing and sending a shiver down her spine.

The first time their hands brushed she nearly fell over but Penelope managed to catch her before she did. Penelope caught her by the waist and with her other hand, she grabbed Josie's.

Hope watched this interaction with amusement because on any other given day if something like this happened, Penelope's eyes would widen - like they were doing now - and she would get all flustered, Josie, on the other hand, would seem unaffected.

However, today, Josie's expression now mirrored Penelope's and her blush was possibly even deeper than hers. Hope now had a sneaking suspicion of why Josie was acting so strange but Penelope was so focused on pulling Josie up and pulling herself together that she didn't notice Josie's deer in headlights look.

The next time their hands brushed, Josie twitched violently enough for Penelope to give her a long and searching look, completely and utterly bewildered as to why Josie was acting so strange. 

Hope just smirked from where she walked because this was exactly how Penelope had acted when she had figured out she liked Josie and had no idea why Penelope hadn't made the connection.

By the sixth time their hands brushed, Josie decided she had had enough. She knelt down to tie her shoelaces and let the other two walk ahead. This way, when she caught up with them, she could walk beside Hope instead of Penelope.

But as she looked down at the shoes she was wearing, she found out that they had no laces and thanked whatever god or gods existed that neither Hope nor Penelope had noticed and just kept walking. She had no clue how she would explain that.

They did, however, both give her a look when she caught up to them and quite obviously pushed the two of them to the side so that she could stand beside Hope, Penelope giving her a look of mild hurt and confusion while Hope gave her a smirk that Josie didn't have the energy to unpack.

When they arrived at the Mystic Grill, she rushed ahead to her normal spot in their booth. She always sat pressed up against the window, facing the rest of the grill. But she forgot that Penelope always sat next to her and it gave her a mini heart attack when she plopped down practically on her lap and slung an arm around her shoulder.

Hope thankfully was ordering them food and was free to laugh at Josie all she wanted because they couldn't hear her.

"What's up with you today?" Penelope questioned, a concerned look on her face, "You're really jumpy."

"What!?" Josie asked, giving Penelope a wild look and moving away from Penelope so quickly that she hit her head on the wall beside her, "I'm not jumpy!? I'm fine." 

She accentuated the 'i'm fine' with a wave of her hand but Penelope wasn't buying it.

"Really, you literally jumped into a wall," Penelope pointed out, raising an annoyingly perfect eyebrow.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Josie said with a deep pout and diverting her eyes from Penelope but was given away when she started rubbing the back of her head where she had hit the wall.

It was then that Hope decided to walk back to them and sit opposite of Josie, "What happened to your head?" she asked concerned.

"Headache," Josie waved off, "All good."

Penelope somehow managed to raise her eyebrow even higher at this, wondering what the hell was up with Josie today and why she was acting this way. She didn't really have a problem with it, she thought it was adorable, she just wanted to know why.

Thankfully for Josie, Hope decided to change the topic and started ranting about how annoying Mr. Mckenna - the teacher that gave her and Josie detention - had been.

Josie somehow managed to keep the conversation off of her odd behavior for the rest of the evening despite the looks that Hope and Penelope kept throwing her whenever Penelope would play with her hair or rest her head on her shoulder.

Josie hadn't realized quite how touchy she and Penelope were until that day. She was fighting every bone in her body to not just kiss Penelope then and there in front of everyone, a task that would have been made a lot easier if Penelope would just stop looking at her like she was some sort of ethereal being.

So when they had finished their food and drinks, paid the bill, and started walking home, Josie made a conscious effort to start her walk beside Hope and not Penelope so that she wouldn't have to pretend to tie her non-existent shoelaces again.

She did, however, get caught staring at Penelope by Penelope more times than she could count even though Hope was standing between them.

So maybe doing nothing about her newfound feelings wasn't quite working. 

So she did what she always did and went to Hope for advice.

The only problem was that they were still walking home and Penelope was still three feet away from her. So Josie couldn't say a single thing.

Not only that but even though they all lived quite close, Hope would get back to her house first but Josie and Penelope would normally walk together to Penelope's house and Josie's would be last.

Josie only realized this right as Hope started walking up to her front door so she had about two seconds to come up with some random excuse as to why she had to talk to Hope and why Penelope should absolutely not join them.

"Hope, can you help me with my English essay?" Josie screamed after Hope rather than helped, "It's due at midnight tonight and I haven't started yet!" she made up wildly.

Hope turned around and took in the pleading look on Josie's face, begging her to one, say yes, and two, not bring up the fact that they didn't have an essay in English.

"I thought Hope said you didn't have-" Penelope started, now sounding unsure of herself but was cut of purposefully by Hope.

"Sure!" Hope yelled over Penelope with a bright, slightly forced smile on her face.

Penelope watched stunned as Josie practically sprinted into Hope's house, muttering a quick goodbye to her.

"Bye Penelope!" Hope yelled pointedly when Penelope made no move to leave.

Penelope shot her a look of indignation but Hope only shrugged in response.

Penelope decided to leave it and keep walking home, but not before sending Hope a message saying that 'she better thank her for this later'.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know your ideas/thoughts!  
> __
> 
> So sorry for the delay, I'll put up two chapters tomorrow to make up for it.


	10. Love is Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie and Hope talk

When Hope closed her front door and turned to face her empty living room, she figured Josie must already be in her room. Her friends had been making a habit of doing that, to waltz right through her house like it was their own. But Hope didn't mind.

As she walked to her door, a broad grin split across her face, one she had managed to hide behind a smirk the whole afternoon but that she could no longer contain.

Even though this was progress in their little 'mission', Josie was still figuring herself out and was probably scared shitless right now so the look of concern that now flashed across her face was not part of her facade. It wasn't just a poker face.

The moment she closed the door to her room and locked it behind her, Josie started talking.

"I'm in love with Penelope!" She blurted out before she could get herself together and it reminded Hope a lot of when Penelope had come out to her.

Josie's face instantly lit up with panic and she backtracked a bit. Hope decided to let her.

"I like girls," Josie said in a rushed but steady voice, her eyes betraying her because if you had just listened to her voice, she nearly sounded calm, "Not just boys."

"I think I like Penelope," Josie said in a defeated tone, looking down at her hands.

Hope's heart broke for the girl because she knew what she was feeling felt like. The realization, the confusion, the panic. It was all part of figuring out who you were and it wasn't all that fun.

Hope rushed from the doorway to where Josie sat on the bed and pulled her into a bone-crushing hug. Unlike Penelope, who was panicked when she figured out her feelings, Josie was scared. So Hope hugged her tighter than she felt she had ever hugged anyone, especially when she felt the tears land on her T-shirt.

"Hey, it's okay," Hope consoled her in a soft voice as she felt Josie shudder in her arms, "It's okay, it's all going to be okay."

Hope continued to trace a pattern onto Josie's back and hold her tight until Josie stopped crying and pulled away.

Josie actually wasn't sure why she had been crying. It could have been many things. 

Her panic and fear maybe. Or years of repressed feelings finally coming to the surface. Or maybe it could have just been the shock. It was all far too overwhelming to be hit by this all at once.

Hope was looking at her not with pity or concern, but with love and understanding.

"You know I love you no matter what right? This doesn't change a single goddam thing to me," Hope paused and took Josie's hand in hers before adding, "I'd be a bit of a hypocrite if it did."

Josie chuckled at this before a question struck her.

"Did you know?" Josie asked, before clarifying, "That I like girls?" Her voice didn't hold any shock or surprise or malice, it was just out of pure curiosity.

Hope weighed up her options here before deciding on the truth, "Yeah, I did know, I've known for a while actually," she said with a shrug of her shoulders.

"How long?" Josie questioned.

"About a year and a half," Hope said with a shrug, "I didn't say anything because I thought you would rather figure it out on your own. I didn't think it was my place to tell you."

Josie nodded with a smile on her face, "Yeah, you were right."

They sat there in comfortable silence for about ten minutes, lying on the bed and staring up at the ceiling.

"So Penelope huh?" Hope questioned with a smirk on her face, looking right at Josie.

Josie just groaned and brought her hands up to cover her face in humiliation, "Don't get me started on that, it's embarrassing."

"It's cute," Hope said, her smirk growing even more prominent. Josie uncovered her face to give Hope a death glare, unfortunately, this revealed her blush too.

"You're blushing!" Hope yelled in glee, pointing at Josie's face, "See, it's cute."

Josie then threw a pillow at Hope but the shorter girl dodged it, laughing as she did so. When the first pillow didn't get her, Josie threw another one. And another one. And another one until it turned into a full-scale pillow fight. One that Josie did not win because Hope was one of the strongest people she had ever met and could beat out all of the guys in any sport.

It ended with Hope pinning Josie's hands above her head and smirking down at her, "So what are you going to do? Are you going to ask her out?" Hope asked with a hopeful tone to her voice.

Josie rushed to shake her head, moving so quickly she gave herself a headache, "No! Of course not!"

Hope frowned at this, what did Josie mean 'of course not'?

"Why not?" Hope questioned, quite genuinely confused.

"Well for starters I only just figured it out," Josie said as if it were obvious.

It was a fair point, Hope thought.

"And I don't even know if she likes me too," Josie added casually.

Hope resisted the urge to burst out into laughter at this because she didn't think it could be any more obvious that Penelope was just as helplessly in love with Josie as Josie was with her. 

Hope shook her head and raised an eyebrow at Josie, somehow managing to not just try and shake some sense into her and instead use her words.

Hope thought she probably shouldn't tell Josie that Penelope would go out with her the second she asked her to and that might be mildly breaking her trust to tell Josie that so she settled on, "You don't have to do it today or anything, but you never know until you ask."

"Do you think she would say yes?" Josie asked hopefully, "Not that I'm gonna do it or anything," She rushed to add.

"I do think she would," Actually, Hope knew she would, "She would be crazy not to."

Everybody reacted a little bit differently when Josie told them. Josie had never been good at keeping a secret so she decided to just seek out her friends the next day and talk to them.

She didn't quite have to 'seek out' Lizzie because they lived in the same house, instead, she just walked up to her in the living room and just told her straight out. Lizzie bounded off the couch and jumped into her arms, pulling her into a tight hug with a bright smile on her face.

Josie swore she heard Lizzie mutter 'finally' under her breath, but before she had the chance to address it, Lizzie pulled away and was telling her how proud she was. Josie decided not to talk to Lizzie about the whole 'Penelope' situation until later that day.

Maya reacted quite similarly to Lizzie, she wasn't at all surprised and just seemed happy that Josie was figuring things out. When Maya asked her how she finally did figure it out, Josie blushed deeply and refused to tell her, considering that how she figured it out was being faced with a sweaty, hot, and bothered Penelope. Nobody needed to know that except for her.

Because she had gone to Maya's house to tell her and Ethan was there too, she decided to tell him too, knowing that if she didn't, Maya would probably do that for her anyway. He just smiled and hugged her before going back to what he was doing, it really didn't change the way any of them thought of her.

Penelope had the strangest reaction out of all of them. When Josie told her, Penelope let out a little squeak of surprise and flushed a deep red but quickly pulled Josie into a hug to try and cover-up. 

Penelope was very proud of the fact that she managed to not scream when Josie had told her, but the moment Josie left her house, she screamed. She then called Hope and screamed at her too. She knew she was acting like a child but she really couldn't care in the slightest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Let me know your thoughts and ideas for the next chapter.


	11. Lovestruck or Lovesick?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie and Penelope acting like idiots.

Now that Penelope knew that Josie had figured out that she liked her too, Penelope was acting nearly as strange and flustered as Josie had been. Every time she even caught Penelope's eyes, they would both blush a deep blood red.

Maya remembered telling Hope how Josie had failed her Math test because she was sat behind Penelope and spent the whole class staring at her to the point where it was getting a little bit creepy. As Maya was sat beside Josie, she had seen the way Josie's eyes lit up in a panic when she looked up at the clock and saw that half an hour had already gone by and she had finished one question.

For about ten minutes, Josie got on with her work and fixed her eyes so forcefully on her paper that Maya could swear that if she got up in front of Josie and started dancing naked, Josie wouldn't notice. But Josie did somehow manage to notice Penelope change positions in her chair to get more comfortable and push her hair back messily. At this point, Josie just gave up on her paper. She figured she could just do the re-sit next week. 

But that wasn't the only standout event.

In the changing rooms, when they were changing Josie couldn't take her eyes off of Penelope, which was fair enough because Penelope did have an amazing body, but it got so obvious that Hope decided to step between Josie and Penelope to block Josie's view of her. This was partly because her staring was making her look the slightest bit like a hormonal teenage boy but mostly because Lizzie was also in this class and she knew that she would make fun of Josie to no end (in the sweetest way possible).

To be honest, even though Penelope was acting similarly to Josie, it wasn't that far out of the normal for her, but the way Josie had been acting was not normal for her and Penelope was rather enjoying watching Josie all flustered and jumpy. It made her smile every time.

The most enjoyable to watch in her opinion was when they had bumped into each other in town on the weekend after Josie had come out to them and Josie ran away from her. Penelope saw out of the corner of her eye, Josie's eyes bulged out of her head when she was Penelope and make a beeline for the nearest alley that she could hide in to escape Penelope.

They had all agreed that Penelope wasn't going to ask Josie out and that Josie had to do it herself. They wanted Josie to go after what she wanted. Josie was never really shy but she never really voiced her opinions or what she wanted either so they thought this might be good to help her be a little selfish for once. Besides, they all knew that Penelope would say yes.

That was, however, easier said than done because it had been nearly two weeks since Josie's big realization and the slow burn was getting unbearable at this point. Even for Penelope who had already been waiting for this for months. 

She would have thought she could wait a few more weeks, but being the only one out of the pair that knew Josie's feelings were requited, she desperately just wanted to get on with it. Even if that meant having to ask Josie out herself.

In two days, the school broke off for spring break and the twins were going to Europe with Caroline and Hope had spent every day of the past 2 weeks, trying to convince Josie to ask out Penelope before she left.

Josie was extremely stubborn though so it took much more convincing than it should have.

At this point, Hope thought that Josie should get her eyes checked because she was completely and utterly blind to Penelope's affection. It got to the point where Hope had to sit on her hands whenever she was talking to Josie to stop herself from either shaking or maybe even slapping some sense into the brunette.

Begrudgingly, Josie had agreed to ask out Penelope, purely because she knew that Hope wasn't going to let this go. In fact, there was no way Hope was going to let it go because - even though Josie didn't know this specifically - she had been trying to get the pair together for a year.

So the plan was for Josie to ask Penelope to go on a date with her when she left for Europe, this meant not having to do a whole speech or anything and if Penelope said no - which was genuinely something Josie was worried about - then she didn't have to see her for a while after that and things would be less awkward.

But whenever Hope wasn't trying to blackmail Josie into asking Penelope out, she was with Lizzie trying to bully Josie into telling them how she finally figured out her feelings.

Hope knew when it had happened because she had been there when it did. She was with the normal Josie before they walked into the gym and left the gym with this strange and jumpy version of Josie.

She just wanted to know how it happened because Josie was refusing to tell anybody and would blush darker than humanly possible whenever the topic was brought up.

And when Josie would refuse to tell them, Lizzie would jump to the topic of Penelope. Josie really couldn't catch a break.

Hope was the only one that knew about when and how Josie was going to ask out Penelope because she had been sworn to secrecy and didn't want to ruin the surprise for Penelope. All she had told the girls was that she was 'working on it' whenever they asked about it. To which Penelope would always respond, 'well can you work quicker?'

Josie was in a very odd situation because she simultaneously was dreading asking Penelope out for fear of being rejected and making things strange between them, but was also struggling to not ask her out every time they were alone together.

For example, today, two days away from her trip to Europe, she was walking home with Penelope. Just Penelope.

Although Josie was making a conscious effort to walk bout a meter away from the raven-haired girl to avoid brushing hands with her - because she knew how that went last time - she was ogling at Penelope so much that she never concentrated on where she was walking. This led to her tripping every two seconds and being steadied by Penelope's hands every time.

They burned into her skin and sent an electric shock all the way through from her head to her toes, not to mention the shiver it would send down her back.

And when she wasn't tripping, she was zoning out whatever Penelope was saying and zoning in on the little specks of brown and yellow in Penelope's green eyes. This led to Penelope having to repeat herself many times.

At one point, Penelope had to snap her fingers in front of Josie's face to get her attention.

"Kym told me that one of the guys, Diego, was planning on asking me out at some point," Penelope said casually.

This certainly got Josie's attention alright. Josie snapped out of her daze and her eyes widened.

"Oh," Josie said, a hint of - actually a whole lot of jealousy tinged in her voice, "that's um... that's great," she managed to get out in the end.

Penelope chuckled to herself at this reaction, "No, it's not, he's a dick," Penelope said matter of factly, "Plus I kind of have my eyes on someone else," she added in a flirtatious tone that she was praying Josie would pick up on.

Josie picked up on it alright and it sent her mind spiraling.

Did this mean Penelope had a crush?

Who did she have a crush on?

Could Penelope have a crush on her?

Was Penelope hinting that she liked her?

Or was Josie just reading far too much into this?

But before Josie could respond, Penelope stopped walking, causing Josie to stop too and take in their surroundings. They had reached Penelope's house.

"Bye," Penelope said cheerily, "see you tomorrow," but before turning around to her front porch and before Josie could say goodbye back, Penelope leaned in and planted a lingering kiss on her cheek.

Josie froze on the spot and closed her eyes on reflex. Bye the time she opened them, she heard a door shut from in front of her and Penelope was nowhere to be seen.

Josie put a hand to her cheek where Penelope's lips had been and smiled to herself.

With everything that Penelope had said to her that day, Josie was more confident and was ready to ask Penelope out. She had planned the whole thing out in her head too and was more nervous than excited.

She had already said goodbye to Hope and to Maya and just had one left to go. She could see Lizzie talking to Maya and Hope out of the corner of her eye but she could feel Hope's eyes drilling into the side of her head, clearly not engrossed int whatever conversation she was having with Lizzie.

She walked up to Penelope and had everything ready.

She hugged Penelope and Penelope hugged her back. She heard Caroline call from behind her that they had to leave now.

This was her moment, things were going how she had planned. Now she just had to say it, 'will you go out will me'.

But she didn't say a word.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't kill me!!
> 
> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know your thoughts!
> 
> follow me on twitter if you feel like it, @minweasel_id


	12. Maybe if I could say the words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit more of a look int everybody's thoughts and why they did what they did

The words wouldn't come out.

The sentence wouldn't form.

She just stared at Penelope who was wearing a bright smile. The smile faded just the slightest bit when she gave Josie a searching look and found her expression to be pained. Penelope guessed correctly that it wasn't about saying goodbye to go on their trip.

Josie looked like she was going to say something. That she wanted to say something but her mouth was tightly sealed, apparently of its own accord.

Just when Penelope thought that Josie might be able to get the words out, Josie's mouth opened and closed. No words coming, not even a noise.

They both just ended up standing there, stock-still. Josie fighting an internal battle and Penelope desperately trying to figure out what battle she was fighting and how to make it better. Then it hit her. She couldn't be a hundred percent sure, but she almost thought that Josie was asking her out. Or at least trying to.

But just as Penelope's eyes bulged in realization and before she was about to step in and do it herself, Josie gave up and walked away. 

Penelope yearned to reach out to her.

To pull her back.

To say the words herself.

But for some reason, she was now going through what Josie had been going through mere seconds ago.

She couldn't do a single thing other than standing there and keep her mouth shut.

That was when she realized her mistake. All their mistake's really. Because it had been her friends plan too.

If it was this hard for Penelope to get up and say the words, then it would be just that much harder for Josie.

While Penelope knew that Josie had feelings for her and that she no doubt would say yes, Josie didn't know that her feelings' weren't unrequited. No amount of convincing from Hope was going to stop the onslaught of voices in her head telling her that there was no way Penelope could like her back. No convincing from anybody could do that without actually saying the words.

'Penelope loves you.'

Penelope realized now that Josie just wasn't going to be able to do it. Wasn't going to be able to ask her out while the fear of rejection still lingered in the back of her head. As if Penelope would ever reject Josie.

But the problem was that Josie didn't know there was no way in hell she would say no. So as much as Penelope wanted Josie to take the first step, she was going to need some encouragement first.

Someone was going to have to tell her. 

__

Lizzie could tell that Josie was out of it for the entire plane trip to Belgium because it was an 8 and a half-hour-long flight and Josie had barely said a word to her. She also had declined twelve calls (Lizzie counted) from Hope while they were still at the airport.

Then when Hope gave up and started spamming her messages but Josie just muted her and refused to read them.

Initially, Lizzie thought they must have gotten into a fight or something, but Josie always got sad whenever she got into a fight with anybody, whether it be her, Hope, Maya, or Penelope so Lizzie knew that it wasn't that.

She knew that if it was serious, Josie would tell her when she was ready and that pushing her on the topic would get her absolutely nowhere.

Lizzie wasn't dumb though, she knew the only thing that had been on Josie's mind for the last two weeks was Penelope. And if Lizzie was adding things up correctly, and had carried the one, then Josie was thinking about Penelope.

Josie had been very stiff ever since her goodbye to Penelope so something must have happened. 

The odd thing was that Lizzie had been watching their goodbye and nothing had happened. Quite literally. They just stood there staring at each other for god knows how long. The only times they moved what so ever was when Josie's mouth started opening and closing. Then when Penelope's eyes widened, and when her hand twitched in Josie's direction, as if she was fighting off the desire to reach out and hold her.

It was strange because Josie was normally talkative. Especially around Penelope. And when she wasn't talkative, she was flustered. The interaction she had witnessed was not flustered, Josie.

Lizzie felt a little stuck here, she didn't know how far she could push things all under the claim that she was helping her sister find love. Which she was trying to do but it was only now that she realized she might be going about things wrong.

__

Once Caroline and the twins had finished unpacking at their hotel, they got ready to go get take out from a nearby restaurant. Their hotel had two rooms. A living room with a pull out couch that Caroline was going to sleep on and a bedroom with two single beds where the twins would sleep.

Lizzie had just finished getting ready when she got a call from Hope. She stepped out of their bedroom and into the living room to answer it.

"Missed me already?" Lizzie teased, smiling as she did so.

"Au contraire Lizzie," Hope teased back and Lizzie practically could see the smirk on her face, "I've never felt freer."

Lizzie just scoffed, "Well why are you calling then?" Lizzie asked, deciding to get right to the point. She got blunt when she was hungry.

"Josie's not answering my calls," Hope replied, just as blunt. That was just kind of how the two of them communicated.

"I'm aware," Lizzie laughed, "But how exactly am I supposed to help with that?"

"Pass the phone to her, dumbass," Hope drawled not unkindly.

"We were about to get take out though," Lizzie said with a huff. When the other end of the call went dead silent and Lizzie could feel Hope glaring at her through the phone, she went on, "But I guess I can just order her food for her."

"Great!" Hope said cheerily. She heard movement from Lizzie's end and assumed that she was getting Josie.

She then heard voices. They were arguing and she was pretty sure it was Josie trying to get out of answering Hope's call. Eventually, someone picked up the phone.

"Hope... Hi, What's up?" the person asked in a very forced cheery tone. It was Josie.

"Oh not much," Hope responded in a sarcastic tone, "Just checking up on you. How was your flight?"

It fooled Josie for about a second and she relaxed, then she heard the sarcasm and tensed up. She stayed silent and waited for Hope to yell at her for not asking Penelope out. But Hope didn't yell.

"Why didn't you ask her?" Hope asked in a soft tone that she had not been expecting. It took her off guard. She was prepared for yelling, but she wasn't prepared to actually talk out her feelings, but apparently that's what was happening.

"I tried! I just couldn't get the words out!" Josie said, her voice slightly raised in anger. But the anger wasn't directed at Hope, it was directed out herself.

"Any particular reason?" Hope asked, still in that same calming tone.

"I don't know! I was just scared, I wasn't sure if she would say yes," And then Josie started to ramble, "I know you said she would but how do you really know? I mean I just don't want anything to change between us. Well yes, I do, but I don't want things to be awkward if she says no, which she might. I know she's been hinting at things but I might just be completely reading into things you know? I just-"

And Hope couldn't take the ramble.

Before she could stop herself, she blurted out, "Oh for god's sake Josie! Penelope likes you too!"

The second she said it, she couldn't decide if she regretted them or not. But it was out there now.

For a second there was only silence from Josie's end. It seemed as though Josie had stopped breathing. But then Josie let out the most child-like scream Hope had ever heard and a smile split across her face. 

She decided she didn't regret her words at all, even if this meant she'd have to explain this to Penelope tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know what you thought!
> 
> Follow me on Twitter if you feel like it @minweasel_id


	13. What if I told you I like you?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Developments happen... Kinda

Hope did feel a little guilty after she ended her call. It hadn't really been her place to tell Josie about Penelope's feelings for her, even if that was what would give her that little extra push to ask Penelope out.

And Josie had seemed so, so happy about it too. The happiest she had seemed in a while. Josie hadn't been sad, she had just been off. And not just for the past 2 weeks but for a while. 

When you looked at her, she just looked like she was missing something. Even when she had been with Rafael, holding his hand or sitting on his lap, she seemed incomplete.

So no, Hope didn't regret her words, that didn't mean she didn't feel bad about it though. It was true that she hadn't intended on saying it, and she hadn't really said all that much. She had only said that Penelope liked Josie too, she hadn't used the word 'love'. And thank god for that because that would seriously have been overstepping a boundary.

And once she said that Penelope liked Josie back, it was mostly just screaming on Josie's end, there weren't really any words being exchanged. 

When Josie wasn't screaming, she was rambling, leaving no room for Hope to get a single word in. It was nice to see - well, hear - Josie like this again, so free. She was like a child, without a care in the world. Hope would call it cute if it weren't for the fear that Penelope would rip her head off.

Hope remembered one time when they were hanging out at Penelope's house, Maya had accidentally hit on Josie in a friendly way - because Maya flirted with anything that moved - and Penelope had been gripping the armchair she was sitting on so hard to stop herself from punching Maya. It got to the point where the underside of the armrest tore apart.

__

By the time Josie had calmed down from her call with Hope, well as calm as she could have been, her phone buzzed again. She assumed that it was Lizzie calling her to open the door to their hotel room, but when she checked the name of the caller, it was Penelope.

Her heart stopped beating for a second before a smile split across her face and she answered.

"Hi!" Josie said with such genuine happiness it almost sounded fake. It also caught Penelope a little off guard.

"Hi," it sounded more like a question, "How was you're flight? And how's you're hotel? Do you have a nice view? I've never been to Belgium before but I've seen photos, they are amazing."

Penelope knew she was rambling at this point, but she was nervous and couldn't help it. 

She wished she had planned out what she was going to say a little more because right now, she had absolutely no clue how to change the topic from Josie's flight and whereabouts to her feelings for the brunette.

"Oh, my flight was great!" Josie said, her cheeriness now giving way to nerves and jitteriness. She wondered if Penelope was going to ask about why she had been acting so strangely when she had left and Josie wasn't quite prepared for that conversation yet. She didn't really want to have to explain herself and then ask Penelope out over the phone, much less from the other side of the world.

"The hotel's small but it's really nice, it's more of an air b&b actually," Josie said, trying to keep the conversation going and not overthink it too much, "It's really cozy."

"Cool... cool," Penelope started, unsure of what she was really going to say.

 _Oh no_ , Josie thought, _here it comes..._

But what Penelope actually said next caught her off guard even more than her asking about why she was acting so strangely would have done.

"I have feelings for you," Penelope blurted out. _'Real Graceful'_ , she thought to herself

Welp. She had said it now.

"You don't have to say anything," Penelope rushed out before Josie could get a word in. 

Really she didn't want Josie to say anything. She wasn't sure what she would say back.

She hadn't even wanted to call in the first place, she wanted to do a voicemail originally so that Josie physically couldn't respond then and there, but she thought that would have been a cop-out and Josie deserved more than that. And a text would have been even more of a cop-out.

"I just wanted you to know," Penelope continued, finally managing to get her bearings on this conversation, "And this doesn't have to change anything about our friendship if you don't want it too."

Penelope paused for a few seconds as if she was letting this information sink in. 

"So yeah," Penelope said, not awkwardly but with confidence, "I hope you have a good time in Belgium... Bye."

Penelope waited for Josie to release a breath she hadn't known she had been holding and let out a shaky, "Bye," in response before hanging up.

Penelope thought she had done rather well. She managed to not break down, or chicken-out, and got the words out. Perhaps it was easier when she didn't have to be face to face with the brunette.

But now that Penelope hung up, she wasn't really sure what to do with herself. Because now, she had to wait nearly a week to get a reaction from Josie. 

__

Josie of coarse had already been told that Penelope liked her, but somehow it sounded different coming from Penelope herself rather than Hope. When Hope said it, she wasn't really putting anything at stake, but when Penelope said it, she was being vulnerable.

The ravenette's trust was something that Josie held dear to her heart and she wore it like a badge of honor. Penelope had no problem getting close to people, but she was rarely ever vulnerable like how she had been today.

There were no tears or anything like that, just pure truth from Penelope. She didn't expect anything in return at the moment and it didn't sound like she could handle getting anything in return either.

The thought of Penelope being nervous around her made something strange stir up in her stomach. It was a weird feeling but it was amazing and a wide smile spread across her face.

Josie had that goofy smile plastered across her face for the entirety of dinner once Lizzie and Caroline came back. Caroline seemed to be very confused at Josie's sudden shift in demeanor, but Lizzie on the other hand gave her a calculating look. Josie pretended like she hadn't seen it.

But when they all got ready for bed and Josie hopped into her bed, Lizzie gave her look from where she was lying in her own head, as if she was expecting Josie to say something.

"Well out with it then!" Lizzie said when it became clear Josie was not getting the memo.

"Out with what?" Josie questioned, genuinely confused.

"What happened with Penelope?" Lizzie questioned, "Whatever it is I know you're dying to talk about it," Lizzie was smirking by the end but her look was also soft and calming.

"How do you know it was something with Penelope?" Josie questioned defensively, despite the fact that she had resigned herself to the fact that they were indeed having this conversation.

"You're all... smiley," Lizzie said with a disgusted look on her face, but Josie could tell she was only joking. Lizzie's nose was all scrunched up how it did whenever she would poke fun at something, but her eyes held no malice.

"Penelope likes me too," Josie said excitedly, expecting more of a reaction. Instead, it looked like there were about a million thoughts running through Lizzie's head. Which there was. 

She was trying to fit the pieces together in her brain but they weren't fitting, so Lizzie just gave up on trying to plan everything out.

She would just let this play out how it was meant to play out. No more meddling was really needed from her, Maya, or Hope.

Deep down, Lizzie knew this was the thing that would give Josie that final push.

It was silent for a second, then Lizzie's lips curled up at the edges, and she smiled genuinely at Josie. Then she springboarded off of her bed and pulled Josie into a quick little side hug, joining her twin in the single bed for the meantime.

"How long did it take you to work that one out?" Lizzie inquired, barely managing to contain her smirk, "Or did someone tell you?"

"You knew!?" Josie yelled in half shock and half betrayal, "Why didn't you tell me!"

Lizzie didn't think that saying 'it wasn't part of the plan' would console Josie whatsoever, so she went with "it wasn't my place to say," and that seemed to do the trick just fine.

Once Josie relaxed into Lizzie's hug once more, the blonde continued, "Of course I knew, I mean why wouldn't she love you? You're you."

Josie only smiled in response.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know you're thoughts and ideas!


	14. It turns out you make me rather nervous

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie comes back from Belgium with Lizzie and they meet up with everybody at the grill.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this one took longer, I had finished it yesterday but I wasn't quite happy with the final product so I did a rewrite.

It was a little strange for Josie. She was across the world from her family and friends. And Penelope.

Out of all of them, she found it hardest to be away from Penelope.

With what she now knew about Penelope's feelings, all she wanted to do was see her. She wanted to talk to her. Hold her. Be with her. She could of coarse talk to Penelope over the phone, but somehow it just didn't feel right.

If she called Penelope and they addressed what Penelope had said over the phone, it would all feel a little lack-luster, at least in Josie's opinion. And if they just ignored what Penelope had said... well, that would take them several steps back after they had made significant progress.

So Josie was confident that she wasn't supposed to call Penelope, that she was supposed to figure things out for herself and then see her in person.

That's what Lizzie told her to do anyways. Figure it out while they were away, and then she could see Penelope when they got back. It was killing Josie to do, but she knew it was probably how things were supposed to go. 

Penelope consumed Josie's each and every thought and it was quite difficult to focus on whatever she was meant to be doing. Even whilst traveling the streets of Belgium, Josie wasn't paying attention to her surroundings in the slightest. This, unfortunately, led to her tripping over, bumping into people, and often even walls.

Most of the time when Josie was thinking about Penelope, she was thinking about what she herself was going to do when they saw each other again. She was going to ask Penelope out, she knew that much. But the how, the when and the where was all still up in the air.

__

Lizzie was sure the advice she gave Josie - about not talking to Penelope until they got back - was good advice, but she wasn't sure if it was right. She was so out of the loop at this point in terms of their 'mission' and genuinely didn't know how both Penelope and Hope telling Josie Penelope liked her had come to fruition.

Hope on the other hand hadn't talked to Josie since Josie first arrived in Belgium. No phone calls, no texts and she was seriously wondering what the hell was going on.

Penelope just desperately wanted to know what was going on in Josie's head. She hadn't really let Josie have much of a reaction when she had called her and wasn't sure if she regretted it now.

And Maya was even more out of the loop then Lizzie.

So suffice to say, nobody really had a clue what was happening.

__

Josie and Lizzie arrived back home on Saturday night, they were considerably jetlagged so they opted to sleep for a good 14 hours.

The next morning, they had plans to meet up with their friends for lunch at the Mystic Grill. They got ready, not having unpacked yet so they found it a little difficult to figure out where everything was. Josie was noticeably jittery and whenever Lizzie brought it up, Josie would just brush her off.

Josie was thankful she started getting ready before Lizzie because if she hadn't, they would certainly have been late. She put her shirt on inside out, and then the wrong way around, she couldn't find matching socks and everything was just a little too much for her.

It was a quick walk into town and Lizzie spent it trying to coax information out of Josie. Namely, what she was going to do about Penelope. Lizzie wasn't quite sure if the reason Josie just completely ignored her when she asked those types of questions was that she didn't want Lizzie to know or if she genuinely didn't know herself.

Lizzie suspected it was the latter.

When they arrived at the grill, the first thing Josie noticed was that Penelope wasn't there, not that Hope and Maya were there and were waving hello to her and Lizzie. She was rather caught off guard from Hope's hug and it took her a good five or so seconds to reciprocate. She was a lot smoother with Maya.

"Where's Penelope?" Josie asked the second she sat down. No 'Hi' or 'How are you'. She just wanted Penelope.

"Is she coming?" Lizzie asked, ignoring Hope's raised eyebrow in her direction.

She better be, Josie thought to herself.

"Yeah..." Maya said, giving Josie a suspicious look, "She's just running late."

Josie noticeably tensed up and relaxed at the same time when she heard this. She gave Maya a curt nod to show that she had heard and understood.

Maya and Hope struck up a conversation with her and Lizzie about Belgium and Lizzie happily took the mic, allowing Josie's mind to stray away from their booth at the grill.

Josie saw her first.

She walked through the door with her head held high and her hair in perfect curls all the way down to her shoulders.

She wore a tight-fitting black top with some rock bands name splayed across it, paired with ripped denim jeans and a white jacket patterned with pink flowers and black stripes.

Her eyes scanned the grill, in search of their group. When she found them, her eyes immediately locked with Josie's. Josie had apparently already been taring at her because brown was glued to green.

Penelope froze and didn't make a sound.

She wasn't quite sure how long she stood there in the middle of the grill, staring into Josie's eyes. It could very easily have been an entire minute. 

The only thing that snapped her out of it was Lizzie's voice booming across the grill, directed to her, "Penelope!" Lizzie exclaimed, smirking when she looked across at Josie and found her to be in a similar state to Penelope, "Get a move on!"

Penelope instantly rushed over to their booth. 

She was saved the awkwardness of bedding down to hug Lizzie when the blonde stood up to hug her instead. Then Lizzie stood aside, letting Penelope enter the booth before her. Penelope instantly froze, forgetting their usual setting arrangement. She always sat next to Josie.

But before she embarrassed herself too much, she unfroze and plopped down beside the brunette, offering her a smile in lieu of a hug.

Maya eyed their interaction with curiosity because normally they would have hugged, even if it was an awkward angle and even if they had seen each other earlier the same day. This time, they hadn't seen each other in a week and all Josie got was a shy smile from Penelope?

Josie, on the other hand, didn't seem to find this strange and just returned the smile, just as sheepishly.

Penelope was going quite literally insane. Her leg kept brushing up against Josie's and it sends a shiver down her spine. Josie on the other hand seemed rather unaffected, but maybe she just wasn't paying attention. Penelope's eyes had been trained on her lap for the past ten minutes and Josie tended to show her emotions through her face and not her body movements.

Penelope didn't really take part in the conversation much, adding in a nod or a hum here and there. Responding only when she was directly spoken to. Josie seemed to be a thing a similar thing.

When Penelope finally raised her eyes from her lap, she immediately regretted it, because the instant she looked up, her eyes met Josie's. Apparently, Josie had been staring at her for a while now. 

At being caught, Josie blushed furiously and looked away, engaging herself in the conversation to try and ignore the fact that she was now having to cross her arms above her chest to make sure her hand didn't accidentally brush Penelope's. 

Now it was Penelope's turn to stare. She hadn't realized how long she had been doing it or that she had been doing it at all until Josie looked back at her and met her eyes once more. They ended up unintentionally taking it in turns to just stare at the other and admire them. Always looking away when they got caught but never noticing how the other three at the table gave them all weird looks.

Of course, Lizzie was the only one up to date on everything that had happened. She wasn't up to date on the 'plan' but she knew what had already happened. Maya knew nothing and Hope only knew what she had told Josie. That explained Josie's odd behavior but not Penelope's.

But despite their confusion and curiosity, none of them were all too fussed about catching themselves up. They were all a lot more focused on containing their laughter at how ridiculous the pair was acting, yet somehow it was rather endearing.

Penelope was quite proud of the fact that she hadn't spontaneously combusted by this point, her heart was pounding so hard in her chest that she was surprised nobody had called an ambulance for her yet. She was sure it must be audible even over all of the noise in the grill because she could hear the pounding loud and clear herself.

She felt suffocated and was finding it quite hard to breathe. Lizzie was pushing her so far up against and she swore Lizzie must be doing it on purpose, but then again, she was normally sitting on Josie's lap so it could just be how Lizzie sat normally. 

It was all just so confusing.

It was too much.

So when Lizzie stood up, announcing she was going to the bathroom, giving Penelope more space, she took her chance. The not knowing of it all was killing her and she just wanted to get it over with.

So the minute Lizzie had disappeared into the women's bathroom, Penelope turned to Josie and purposefully met her eyes for the first time this night, not shying away from Josie's chocolate brown orbs when they met her own.

"Can we talk?" Penelope asked in a hushed enough whisper that she hoped Maya and Hope wouldn't hear, but to be honest, she didn't really care.

Josie gave a jerk of the head, her eyes trailing after Penelope when she stood up to leave the grill. Penelope didn't look back and just assumed that Josie would follow her. She was right because Josie seemed to be trailing after her like a lost puppy.

When Josie met her outside, Penelope automatically led her a little bit away from the grill. The ended up in the town center, standing beside a tall tree, it's many leaves shading them from the sun.

Brown eyes met green and they stayed staring into each other's eyes for a long time. They both looked very, very nervous, in fact, they both looked like they were on the edge of a heart attack.

And Josie was confident that she was having a heart attack when Penelope took her hands in her own. It was only now that Josie's eyes looked down, staring at their intertwined fingers. It was funny how different it now felt because they held hands all the time. It wasn't exactly a rare occurrence, but now it made Josie feel loved. It made her feel special.

She looked back up when Penelope inhaled in a sharp breath as if she was setting herself up for some long romantic speech that she had already planned out. This was probably true, Josie wouldn't know because she never got to hear what Penelope was going to say, because before Penelope could get a word out, Josie's mouth started moving before her brain could catch up. 

"Do you want to go on a date with me?"

She heard the words as if they had come from somebody else's mouth and hadn't quite realized that she herself had said them until Penelope's eyes popped out of her head. 

But the moment that Josie caught herself, it became clear to Penelope that she hadn't meant to say it because Josie's face lit up in surprise and her eyes bulged out of her head further than Penelope had ever seen them.

Penelope could read Josie better than anybody else and could tell that Josie was panicking. She could tell because Josie always did this thing where she pulled her bottom lip between her lip when she was nervous and it always drove Penelope absolutely insane.

So to spare Josie the mild panic attack that she could sense coming, she did the only logical thing one could do in this situation and connected her lips with Josie's.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading I hope it lived up to your expectations, obviously there will be more from this specific scene in the next chapter :)
> 
> Let me know your thoughts and ideas because I'm not all that sure where I want the story to go now.


	15. Could you repeat that for me?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So they kissed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay, my school year starts back up the day after tomorrow and I've had to set up a whole lot of things including my new computer so the writing got a lil bit complicated to do.

Penelope hadn't quite planned on doing it - kissing Josie. It had just kind of happened. Well actually no, there had been some thought behind the action, but she kind of reacted before thinking it through.

Actually that was an understatement.

She hadn't thought about the fact that kissing Josie actually meant kissing Josie.

Because now that her lips were pressed against Josie's, she froze and her mind went blank.

She wasn't sure exactly how long it took for Josie to reciprocate the kiss, but the next thing she knew, Josie's lips were pushing back into hers with a passion and a pair of smooth hands had reached down to cup her cheeks once they had finished flailing around in the air.

Eventually, when the need for air became too strong, they pulled apart, but they didn't go far. Their faces stayed barely an inch apart.

And as both their eyes flickered open and green met brown, a deep flush simultaneously covered both their cheeks. Neither of them knew who initiated it again, but in a flash, one of them had pulled the other back in.

They moved in tandem, Josie's hands now gripping at Penelope's hips while Penelope had both hands cupping Josie's face. Penelope stood on her tippy-toes as to deepen the kiss. It wasn't Penelope's first choice as of how to deepen the kiss, because quite frankly, having to stand on her tippy-toes to kiss Josie was something her friends would most definitely tease her about, but when tugging at Josie's face in an effort to bring it down to her own proved unsuccessful, she was left with no choice.

Josie turned her head to the side to match Penelope and deepen the kiss even further. Penelope's jaw went slack at this and the kiss failed her. Well rather, she failed the kiss.

Josie took this opportunity to slip her tongue between Penelope's perfectly sculpted lips at which Penelope went weak at the knees but she responded in kind, exploring Josie's mouth with her tongue as though this was the last time she would ever get to do so.

Penelope tugged Josie's bottom lip between her teeth for reasons unknown to even her but was pleased by the way Josie seemed to lose her grip

Neither knew how long they had stayed that way, moving together as though they had been doing this for months, years, their whole lives. Swaying together as if they had been dancing this dance since the day they were born.

But at some point, they simply had to pull apart. Penelope might faint due to how little breath she had at that moment.

Josie's lips were swollen and she was sure hers must look similar. At this moment, Penelope was very glad that she had opted to wear lip balm rather than lipstick today because it would surely have been smudged. Josie tended to not wear make-up at all unless there was a special event so she didn't have anything to worry about.

Penelope felt rather light-headed although that might be due to the fact that she had just kissed Josie fricking Saltzman. Penelope only now realized that she had been too focused on her actions to fully take in what had just happened. She had just kissed Josie. The girl she had been chasing after for months. The girl she had been in love with for years. She had just kissed Josie.

And she hadn't even savored it. Savored the way that Josie tasted like a mix of cinnamon and vanilla. She tasted sweet and it was addicting. All Penelope wanted to do was pull Josie back into the kiss even though she really had to catch her breath and they really should talk about what just happened.

Penelope's eyes slowly fluttered open to find a flushed and rather sheepish looking Josie staring down at her. They simply stared into each other's eyes for far too long, acting rather shyly for two people who had quite literally just made out in the dead center of town where anybody could have been watching.

It was rather scary how quickly things could change between them. One second they were being open and honest, the next they weren't talking or looking at each other, and the next they were kissing. 

They were kissing. 

Kissing.

Yes, kissing. 

They had been kissing.

"Uhhh," Penelope said, drawling out the word, her eyes searching Josie's face for some sort of notion as to what she was supposed to do now.

Josie proved to be no help whatsoever and just stared at Penelope. Her look wasn't expecting, it wasn't like she was waiting for her to say something, her look was dazed and she just looked a little out of it.

"I like you," Josie breathed out, catching Penelope off guard.

"Yeah no shit," Penelope replied with a lopsided grin. Josie giggled at this, shaking her head in adoration. But what started as a simple giggle had now turned into a full-on laughing fit and Penelope couldn't help but join in. Josie's laugh was contagious. In Penelope's opinion, anybody who didn't laugh when Josie was laughing was lacking a soul.

When Josie finally pulled herself together, she flashed Penelope a cheeky grin, "To be fair, you jumped me," Josie pointed out, the smirk audible in her voice.

Penelope's eyes widened and it took a while before she regained her grip on reality, "I did not jump you!" Penelope exclaimed indignantly, trying to shrug off Josie's insinuation, "I was merely trying to stop your incoming panic attack. I thought you might scare yourself to death."

Josie's cheeks flushed at the mention of her having accidentally asked out the ravenette.

Penelope's smirk was real this time as she watched Josie try to come up with an excuse or a witty comeback.

"So about that date," Penelope started, not giving Josie the chance to get a word in, "Did you mean it?" Penelope's voice seemed to waver when she asked that last question.

Josie's eyebrows scrunched together in confusion, "What do you mean did I mean it?" she asked, she wasn't sure how she could have been any clearer.

"I mean do you really want to go out on a date with me?" Penelope clarified, her voice a mixture of hesitation, concern, fright and hope all in one. 

Josie's eyebrows only grew closer, "Well that is what I said," Josie said, now cocking her head to the side to figure out what Penelope was getting at. 

Apparently this wasn't enough of an answer for Penelope as her eyes seemed to burn into Josie's soul and they were searching her for an answer. One which Josie finally gave, "Yes. Yes, I want to go out with you," Josie said in a soft tone, her hand reaching up to brush the hair now covering one half of Penelope's face behind her ear.

Penelope ignored the shiver that Josie's action had sent down her spine and breathed out a sigh of relief, "Okay, good. Good."

"Were you worried that I hadn't meant it?" Josie questioned. She got her answer when Penelope looked away sheepishly a deep blush covering her cheeks and her embarrassment visible all over her face. Penelope was so easy to read, it was a wonder the rest of the school hadn't figured out she wasn't a bitch who thought she was above everyone.

Josie just scoffed in indignation at Penelope, "You can be really dumb sometimes Penelope," Josie said, but despite her words, her tone held no malice.

Penelope knew that she was being dumb because for months, the others had been convincing her that Josie liked her back and for months she had been convincing herself the same thing. But it was one thing to be told by Hope or Maya or Lizzie, and a whole different one to be told from Josie directly.

"Oh shut up," Penelope said, mildly mortified at how vulnerable she was being right now. Josie raised her eyebrows but let it go.

"I'd like to go out with you Josie," Penelope said in a firm tone much too serious for the conversation they were having right now.

"Okay," Josie said with a nod.

"Okay," Penelope replied, mirroring Josie's nod.

They stood that way, neither saying a word for about a minute before Josie decided to break the silence.

"Are you free tomorrow after school?" Josie asked, a grin plastered across her face.

Penelope actually wasn't sure if she was free or not, but she found herself saying "Yes," without any hesitation whatsoever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Let me know your thoughts/ideas and stuffs!


	16. I forgot to buy a ticket to the movie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maya, Lizzie and Hope do a lil bit of snooping.

Maya Hope and Lizzie had been waiting in the grill for over half an hour now since Penelope and Josie left. They were all on the edge of their seats waiting to find out what had happened but they were growing a little bit impatient. 

Maya and Hope would claim that they just wanted their friends to be happy, but truthfully, both of them were just as big of a gossip as Lizzie. At least Lizzie didn't try to hide the fact that she lived off of drama, especially when either she or one of her close friends was part of it.

Not only that, but this had been one slow burn that was becoming painful to watch. It has been cute and endearing at some points, annoying at others, and now it was painful despite how funny it had been to watch them fumble over themselves around each other. To say that the three of them were invested would be an understatement. At this point, even Ethan had joined in on the festivities and had often joined their discussions about the pair whenever they were at their house rather than one of their own.

So the three of them sat in the back corner of the grill in silence. Occasionally looking up to see if either Penelope or Josie had gotten back yet or to check the time. Initially, they had discussed what the pair could possibly be doing but that got old after a while.

Suddenly, Lizzie stood up and started walking towards the door, taking both Hope and Maya by surprise.

"Where are you going?" Hope questioned, both out of curiosity and suspicion.

"To go see what they're doing," Lizzie stated casually as if it were obvious.

At the exact same instant as when Hope exclaimed, "You can't do that!" indignantly, Maya stood up, "I'll join you," She said.

Hope shook her head and looked at the other two with mixed feelings. Eventually, she gave in and stood up to follow them.

Of course, they had no clue where exactly the pair had gone so they ended up walking around for a little while before poking their heads around the corner of an Italian restaurant and spotted them underneath an old oak tree at the very center of town. They weren't exactly being discreet.

Upon spotting them, they all backtracked a little and put themselves in a position where they could watch and not be seen. Once they got in position, they looked like an image right from a cheesy spy movie. All of their heads popping around the corner, one on top of the other.

They looked over at Josie and Penelope who both seemed to be in a mildly disheveled state. Penelope seemed to be blushing at something that Josie had said and avoided her eyes. A lot of it was unintelligible to the three of them, but they kept watching all the same. A minute later, they watched the two exchange a sharp nod of the head before standing there perfectly still and perfectly silent, just staring into the eyes of each other.

Then, taking the three of them surprise and Penelope too by the looks of it, Josie dipped her head down to kiss Penelope, both hands cupping her cheeks. Once Penelope got a hold of herself, she brought her hands to Josie's waist and tried to pull her in closer.

This hadn't seemed to work because it looked as though Josie was now pulling away. Penelope apparently didn't like that at all and took it upon herself to stand on her tippy toes for the second time that night (not that the three of them knew that) to reach her.

Josie just smiled into the kiss and let Penelope pull her back in.

Maya and Hope both smiled as they watched.

Both their eyes were trained on the couple in front of them, not able to look away until they heard Lizzie make a gagging noise from beside them, finally making them lookup.

Lizzie had a mildly disgusted look on her face as though she was wishing that she could unsee everything she had just witnessed.

"I did not need to see my sister making out with Penelope," Lizzie said, her face all contorted and scrunched up.

Hope raised an eyebrow but Maya decided to voice what she was actually seeing.

"It was your idea to come here," Maya said with a giggle, "And haven't we all spent a year trying to get them together?"

"Yeah well, imagining is one thing but seeing..." Lizzie stopped for dramatic effect, letting the other two finish her sentence for her in their heads. She waved her hands around in the air to further prove her point.

Hope and Maya laughed at Lizzie's discomfort before Hope's turned to one of panic as she saw the aforementioned couple walking towards them. Hope started to run away from Maya and Lizzie who both yelled after her bewildered until they looked behind them and saw Josie and Penelope walking towards their hiding spot and they ran after Hope. 

Because they were in such a rush to get out of there and back to the grill, they all completely missed Josie and Penelope's intertwined fingers.

Thankfully neither Josie nor Penelope had seen them.

__

Josie and Penelope let go of each other's hands before walking back into the grill. To say they were surprised to be met with a sweaty and red-faced Lizzie and Maya would be an understatement but they just went on like normal and sat down in their booth.

"Have you guys paid yet?" Josie asked casually.

"Uh... No," Lizzie said, inadvertently avoiding eye contact with both Josie and Penelope, "I think it's my turn to pay... so... I'll just... go do that."

Lizzie trotted off, wallet in hand, towards the bar.

"So," Penelope started in an equally casual tone as Josie, "What did we miss."

"Oh," Maya waved her hand in the air aimlessly her voice wavering slightly, "Not much."

"Not much?" Penelope questioned with an eyebrow raised in the air, "You look like you just ran a marathon."

Maya just waved her off with a quick dismissal of 'it's hot in here' before she started packing up her things, getting ready to walk back home.

__

It was funny how the tables had turned on their walk. Penelope and Josie were back to how they normally were if you ignored the now constant lingering looks and the sheer amount of times their hands were so close to intertwining it was ridiculous. But Hope, Lizzie, and Maya were now acting incredibly strange.

Lizzie most of all was struggling to not bring up the topic of their relationship, her lips stayed sealed shut the entire walk back like she was scared that if she opened her mouth, she wouldn't be able to control what came out.

When they reached Hope's house, Penelope tried to be subtle as she said something about a school project with Hope and walked with Hope up to her front door. Normally, Hope would at least put up a fight first but today she didn't even put up a fight. Maya also ended up tagging along with the pair, saying something about the same project and joining them despite the fact that they didn't share a single class with all three of them together.

Of coarse Josie knew that they weren't going to do anything related to a project, but she didn't know that Hope and Maya knew that too.

As soon as the door had slammed shut behind Maya, leaving Lizzie and Josie alone on the sidewalk, Lizzie popped the question.

"When's the date?" She blurted out.

Josie didn't even try to figure out how Lizzie had known they were going on a date and just put it down to her being good at reading people.

"Tomorrow," Josie said dreamily, her eyes sparkling in the sun like some rom-com Lizzie was sure she had watched. A wide smile had split across the brunette's face.

Lizzie on the other hand did not seem too pleased with this information and her eyes lit up in a panic.

"You mean to say I only have one day to prepare!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Let me know what you thought!


	17. Preparation is key but we don't have time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie and Penelope get scolded before preparing for their date.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i didn't have time to edit this so if there are mistakes i'm sorry.

Josie shook her head in laughter at her sister. Josie had just kissed the girl that she had been in love with for god knows how long, had just held her hand, had just asked her on a date and Lizzie didn't care about any of that. All Lizzie cared about was planning the date. And she wasn't even the one going on it!

Josie loved Lizzie so much which is why she could admit that Lizzie was ridiculous sometimes. Maybe people would find her invasive but Josie just found it endearing, how much Lizzie was rooting for the pair of them to work.

So Josie just stood there, in the driveway of Hope's house, shaking her head at Lizzie and giggling to herself. But Lizzie was not laughing. In fact, she looked livid.

"I'm serious Josie!" Lizzie exclaimed waving her hands in the air, "This has to go perfect and you are only giving me one day to prepare? I mean what are you going to wear? How are you going to do your hair?"

"I'll figure it out," Josie said with a shrug of her shoulders, walking in the direction of their house and away from Lizzie who chased after her to continue her rant.

"No you won't," Lizzie stated matter of factly, "I love you Josie, but you turn into a nervous wreck around Penelope and you are just a wreck in general when it comes to romance."

Josie puffed out her bottom lip in a pout and glared at Lizzie, "You know I'm right," was Lizzie's only reply. It was true. Josie did know she was right. She was a total shipwreck when it comes to relationships but Lizzie didn't have to be so blunt about it.

Lizzie took her silence as a sign to continue, so she went on, "So I am going to have to get you all dressed up," Lizzie paused for thought for a second, "Wait, hold on, what are you guys even doing? For your date I mean," she clarified.

"Dinner."

"Well that's boring," Lizzie said, deflating slightly, "Where are you going?"

Josie averted her eyes from Lizzie's searching orbs because she knew what was about to come, "I don't know, it's supposed to be a surprise."

Lizzie suddenly stopped walking and fixed Josie with a look, "Whose planning it?" she asked, the look on her face telling Josie she already knew the answer.

"Me."

Lizzie didn't even have the energy to go on another rant, she swore she put more effort into this relationship than Josie did. She shook her head and brought her hands up to rub her temples.

Josie wasn't quite sure what was going on in Lizzie's head but she was sure she could hear Lizzie mumbling something along the lines of 'murder means prison' under her breath and repeating it over and over again. After about a minute of this - in which Josie was going increasingly more concerned - Lizzie finally looked up, a smile so bright plastered across her face that it was most definitely fake.

Josie furrowed her eyebrows together in a mix of confusion at Lizzie's behavior and fear. That only intensified when Lizzie started walking again. This time it was Josie who had to chase after her.

Before Josie could even get a word in, Lizzie spoke up.

"So tell me what happened when you left the grill," her voice sounded so strange, it wasn't completely faked because she really did want to know how they had progressed from jumping ten feet in the air any time the hair on their arms brushed to making out in the center of town, but she also sounded a little bit scary.

Josie hastened to dive into the story as they continued to walk, scared that Lizzie might do something drastic if she didn't.

__

"What the fuck happened!?" Hope exclaimed as soon as her bedroom door slammed behind the three of them. The number of times one of Hope's friends had stormed into this room to have an important conversation - most likely Penelope talking about Josie or the other way around - was getting ridiculous.

"Yeah!" Maya joined in, "One second you're int he grill acting like a twelve-year-old with a stupid crush and the next you're making out in the middle of town!" Maya was by no means mad at this development, just amused.

Penelope fixed Maya with a suspicious look, "How did you know we kissed?" She asked.

Hope shot Maya a glare, clearly, Penelope wasn't supposed to know they had been watching.

"Just a hunch," Maya tried to brush off casually.

It didn't work because Penelope's eyes soon widened in understanding, "You were spying!?" she exclaimed in shock. Maybe a hint of anger there too. And there was a whole lot of embarrassment too.

Although it hadn't been Penelope's first kiss, she currently wasn't fond of the idea of her friends watching her make out with Josie. And she definitely didn't like the idea of Lizzie watching it either seeing as it was her twin that Penelope had been kissing.

When both Hope and Maya looked down at the floor, either apologetically or to hide their laughter, Penelope didn't know, she got her answer.

"You were spying!" Penelope yelled but this time it was a statement and not a question, "How much did you see?"

"Only like a minute before you guys started walking back, then we ran," Maya explained.

Penelope sighed in relief. This meant they had only seen their second kiss which was good because the first one had been decidedly more intense.

"So back to the question at hand," Hope said, extending her words in an insinuating tone, "When's the date?"

"Tomorrow."

"Tomorrow!?" the other two exclaimed with panic-stricken voices.

"That is what I said. I think we're doing a dinner," Penelope went on, completely missing the scandalized look on the other two's faces, "I'm not sure where because it's supposed to be a surprise seeing as Josie is the one who asked me out."

It was then that Penelope looked up and saw Hope staring at her like she was crazy, "What?" she asked, now suddenly a little self-conscious.

"We only have one day to prepare you for this! What were you thinking?" Hope asked as if Penelope was crazy.

"I don't need to prepare, I already have clothes I can wear, Josie is the one that has to plan it," Penelope said with a shrug.

"I meant mentally," Hope deadpanned, "We need to mentally prepare you."

"No you don't, I am perfectly fine," Penelope said defensively.

"You're not-" Hope started but Maya cut her off to try a different approach.

"Even if you're not," she started tentatively, "You don't have much experience in dating so you need to be romantic and all that."

"I have experience!" Penelope said, right back to being defensive.

"Not with someone you ever really liked," Maya explained kindly, "And certainly not with anybody you like as much as Josie."

__

Lizzie ended up planning the entire date for Josie. Well, Maya helped a lot too in terms of actually setting it up but it was Lizzie's idea.

On Monday after school, Hope stayed with Penelope to help her get ready while Lizzie helped Josie. Lizzie and Hope ended up spending the entire time on their phones on a call to each other trying to figure out what clothing would best suit the date.

They ended up going for the more casual side of things. Josie was wearing a sundress while Penelope was wearing a cropped white shirt with high-waisted, blue, ripped jeans.

Maya on the other hand went with Ethan to go get everything prepared. They bought all of the food from the supermarket and laid out all of the blankets for the picnic. They had even set out some fairy lights for the pair.

They had thought of everything. 

They had most definitely gone completely overboard but they had been waiting for this moment for so long that if they hadn't gone all out then it would have been a cop-out. Besides, everybody knew that Josie was a sucker for this type of stuff and that Penelope was a secret romantic.

Lizzie somehow had managed to get Caroline to agree to Josie driving the car to pick Penelope up and might have agreed to do the cooking for a week which she was definitely going to palm off onto Josie.

So at five to six, Josie hopped in the car and started driving to Penelope's house. She was about to get out to go knock on Penelope's door when the passenger door opened and Penelope got into the car. She sat down nervously and shut the door behind her, turning to give Josie a blinding smile.

"Hi," Penelope started before looking Josie up and down, "You look amazing by the way."

Josie blushed deeply but somehow managed to get out a little 'you two'.

Their little moment was completely ruined when Hope knocked on the window of the car, yelling "Get on with it!" at them. They both laughed at their friend's antics before Josie put her foot on the pedal and they were on their way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know your thoughts!


	18. Did I hang the stars or something?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Date Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> didn't have time to proofread so feel free to point out any mistakes.

Maya and Ethan had gone all out on this little date. Truth be told, Josie didn't know half of what they had done, she knew about the picnic and the location but she had no idea they had spent hours making every little detail perfect. Maya hadn't spent this long trying to get the pair together for them to have a 'normal' date, it was going to be the best first date in the history of first dates god damn it!

That was the phrase that Maya kept repeating to Ethan every time he would put something a millimeter out of place. Ethan was surprised that his love for Penelope and Josie had stretched far enough for him to put up with his sister's antics.

They had started at the supermarket with a list of different foods to buy made by the twins. Well, really it was just made by Josie. Lizzie had written it initially but Josie had crossed out so many things from the list because Penelope didn't like them, or added new snacks because she knew they were Penelope's favorites that Josie had pretty much just ended up writing the whole thing.

Despite the fact that Lizzie knew how much Josie and Penelope cared about each other, they still sometimes surprised her by managing to pick up on those little details.

Like how months ago, when Penelope's parents had been fighting, Josie noticed that something was up with Penelope the moment she saw her despite the fact that Lizzie, Maya, and Hope had each had a class with her and hadn't noticed anything. And Penelope was pretty tough to read. Or how Penelope could always tell when Josie was getting anxious about something and would always make her speak up about it. Josie would always claim that it was stupid but somehow Penelope could get her to talk while Lizzie - her twin - or Hope - her best friend - couldn't coax a single word out of her.

But despite all of this, despite the fact that Penelope most certainly was not about to break Josie's heart, she still felt it was her duty as her sister to at least threaten her a little bit.

So the moment Josie and she set off in their car, with her and Hope standing in the driveway waving them off as if they were sending their kids off to college, she messaged Penelope. 

It read; 'if you hurt her in any way possible, i will banish you from all of our lives and into the realms of hell'

When Penelope felt her phone buzz, disrupting the music in the car, she reached down to check the message and let out a snort of laughter. It was such a Lizzie thing to do and say even if she had just spent an eternity getting the pair together and teasing Penelope for how helplessly in love with Josie she was.

"What?" Josie asked, side-eyeing Penelope, looking down at her phone.

"Just Lizzie being Lizzie," Penelope shrugged off, still chuckling to herself.

"She gave you the shovel talk didn't she?" Josie asked, rolling her eyes in an unsuccessful attempt to hide her laughter.

"In her own special way," Penelope said, "I mean who other than Lizzie would 'banish me from your lives and into the realms of hell?" she asked in an oddly accurate impersonation of Lizzie which had Josie wondering if she had practiced it before.

Josie let out a bark of laughter as she took a left turn to take them out of town and in the direction of Salvatore's old boarding house.

"Sorry about her," Josie said, shaking her head at Lizzie's antic's.

"Oh don't worry, you're Mom's was far worse," Penelope waved her off casually.

Josie wished she was drinking water at that moment so that she could od a spit take, "My Mom gave you the shovel talk too?" she asked, eyes wide, not knowing whether to laugh or not but Penelope ended up making the choice for her when she laughed at the scandalized look on her face.

"Yup," Penelope said, accentuation the pop on the 'p', "Caroline can be kind of scary if she wants to be, I mean she somehow managed to simultaneously give me her blessing and threaten to kill me slowly if I hurt you."

"When did she even have time to do this?" Josie asked, shaking her head again whilst trying to keep her eyes focused on the road. So now two members of her family had threatened Penelope. Great. What an excellent start to this relationship thing they had going on.

That reminded Josie that they hadn't actually discussed the terms of this thing. Were they dating? Were they in a relationship? But thankfully for her, Penelope spoke up before she could go down that specific spiral.

"Remember the dance earlier this year?" Penelope asked, but apparently the question was rhetorical because she surged ahead, "Well she sent you and Hope off into the dance and kept me back."

"Oh, I do remember that," Josie said as the memory hit her, "I asked about what she said when I met you by the drinks but I never got an answer."

"That's because you were too busy being jealous over the fact that I was dancing with Ethan and not you," Penelope let out with a snort of laughter, trying to keep a straight face but completely given away by the wide smile on her face.

"I was not jealous," Josie tried to shrug off.

"Yes, you were," Penelope said giving her a pointed look.

Josie was half glad that she couldn't fully take in Penelope's current state and that she had to focus on the road because she wasn't sure she could handle the smugness on the ravenette's face combined with the deep blush now spreading across her own cheeks.

"I didn't know what I was feeling!" Josie half yelled defensively.

"Doesn't change the fact that you were jealous," Penelope said, positively ecstatic at how this was going, "You might not have known it then but you know now."

Josie decided to just ignore Penelope. She didn't even spare her a glance, no matter how much she longed to.

"That brings me to a very important question actually," Penelope said in a mischievous tone, deciding that she was not done teasing Josie, "When did you figure it out?"

"You know when I figured it out," Josie brushed off, her body stiffening in. embarrassment and keeping her eyes firmly focused not he winding trail they were now taking into the forest, "It was that day Hope and I had detention."

"Oh I know what day it was but I want to know what moment," Penelope explained, gesturing wildly with her hands, "Lizzie always talked about the moment you know, like the moment that flips that flip's that switch in your brain and suddenly you see something you didn't before."

Penelope was talking so passionately that she hadn't even realized she was rambling and just looked at Josie expectantly.

"I... Umm..." Josie fumbled over her words, remembering perfectly well how the sight of a sweaty, flustered and red-faced Penelope had flipped her switch but not really wanting to divulge that information, "It was when we met you at the gym."

"Yes, but what moment?" Penelope pushed further, reveling in Josie's embarrassment. Josie's face just flushed impossibly deeper and she stayed silent. She hadn't divulged this information to Hope, Maya, or Lizzie and she certainly was not going to tell Penelope. 

So Penelope just started wracking her brain and went through that day. She had finished her stretches when the pair walked in. She had said hi and went straight to the water fountain, brushing passed Josie in her sweaty, flustered and red-faced state.

And that was the moment. Penelope just couldn't figure out what about her brushing passed Josie in her sweaty, flustered and red-faced state had flipped Josie's switch.

In her sweaty, flustered and red-faced state.

Sweaty.

Flustered.

Red-faced.

State.

The instant Penelope put the pieces together, her own face went bright red before she let out a bark of laughter. Josie seemed to relax at the sound. Maybe she thought that it would scare Penelope off but Penelope just seemed to find it the funniest thing in the world.

They just straight-up laughed at each other for the next minute before Josie asked a question of her own.

"So what was your moment?" she asked curiously.

"Oh we don't need to talk about that," Penelope said pointedly, averting her gaze from Josie.

After spending a while trying to pull herself together after her last laughing fit, she fell right into another one, "You hypocrite," she said, laughing at Penelope as she finally stopped the car.

"Would you look at that?" Penelope said, completely ignoring Josie, "We're here!" And without further adieu, she got up and left, slamming the car door. Josie snorted in laughter but managed to put on a straight face before she left the car.

Penelope was spinning around in circles, trying to figure out exactly where they were seeing as she hadn't paid the slightest bit of attention to where they were going.

"I thought we were doing dinner," Penelope said, eyebrows furrowed in confusion, "not going for an evening jog."

"We are doing dinner, idiot," Josie said, slapping Penelope on the arm, "Just follow me."

Josie turned around to lock the car before - without warning - grabbing Penelope's hand and leading her through a winding path through the woods, much too small for a car to fit through.

"It's only about three minutes through here," Josie explained, completely missing the way Penelope's eyes were trained on their intertwined hands and nowhere else.

They walked in silence for the next three minutes until Josie slowed down, signaling to Penelope that she should probably look up and see what exactly Josie had prepared for her. Josie took her around one more corner before her jaw dropped.

Josie was fighting very hard not to let the surprise overtake her own face because this was a lot more intense than she had envisioned. But it was beautiful and it was perfect.

There was a white and red striped blanket on the floor in the middle of the little clearing, fairy lights spread all across it. And not he red blanket, there were two baskets, one with food and one with cushions, blankets, and jackets.

Josie managed to pull herself together a lot quicker than Penelope was seeing as - for the most part - she had known what was coming. She leaned down to give Penelope a kiss on the cheek before pulling her unmoving form down to the picnic blanket.

Penelope just followed after her like a lost puppy, staring around in awe.

Josie sat down on the blanket and because their hands were still molded together, Penelope was taken down with her, stumbling all the way.

She somehow managed to tear her eyes away from the scene and look into Josie's bright brown orbs. Words failed her but actions didn't. So she leaned in and kissed Josie who had the audacity to seem surprised by the act of affection.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be continued...
> 
> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know what you thought!


	19. Possibly not quite as romantic as you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Penelope's moment... (date part 2)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is a little bit sadder, not angsty just sadder, so sorry about that.

Josie let out a little squeak of surprise when Penelope connected their lips and for a few seconds, she let her hands wave around in the air, trying to wrap around what exactly was happening before they finally made their way to the back of Penelope's head.

She pulled Penelope down towards herself but she may have pulled a little too hard because she landed with her back on the floor and with Penelope lying on top of her. While she felt her own cheeks heat up at their change in position, Penelope didn't seem too fazed as she had stayed connected to Josie the whole way down.

This time, Penelope savored the kiss. She savored every second of it. She didn't focus on anything around them despite how beautiful the clearing they were in was, she didn't focus on her own fear or worries, for now, she just wanted to focus on Josie. She wanted to be able to replay this moment in her head tonight when she fell asleep and not have any part of the memory clouded by anything. She wanted everything about this to stick in her head. She wanted to be able to recount this memory to Hope when she crashed at the girl's house and stayed up till 4 am with her just recounting this memory. She would probably leave out a few details for Hope's sake but still.

When Penelope eventually pulled away for a much-needed breath, she didn't go far, just hovered over Josie's face, her own hair lightly brushing Josie's cheeks. Josie gave her a goofy smile that stretched all the way across her face and reached her eyes, giving them a light that Penelope rarely ever saw.

"I'll take that as a sign that you like the picnic?" Josie questioned with nerves that were completely unnecessary and very much contradicted the look on her face.

"Like it? I love it!" Penelope exclaimed her voice filled with pure unadulterated affection, "It's beautiful, it's amazing. When the hell did you have time to do this?"

"I may have gotten a little bit of help from Maya," Josie explained, only now taking note of the fact that Penelope's hand was casually stroking along the side of her arm and drawing little patterns there, all whilst holding eye contact with Josie, "And Ethan too, apparently she drove her insane trying to make everything perfect."

"Well it is perfect," Penelope said with a bright smile before she peered around the clearing and her eyes landed on the basket of food, her eyes lighting up when she saw what was there.

Josie looked over her head to see what Penelope was looking at and her eyes landed on the basket of food, filled with everything Penelope loved. 

"I may have had something to do with the food though," Josie said with a smirk, feeling rather proud of herself at this moment. Penelope flashed her a look but swiftly headed over to grab something to eat.

Eventually, they fell back into their normal conversation once they had settled into the date a little more and inevitably, the conversation drifted back to the one they had in the car. The one thing Penelope had been trying to avoid, her 'moment'.

"Whatever it was," Josie said, catching her out of the corner of her eye while she stared straight ahead into the bushes, "I can promise you that mine was more embarrassing."

"Mine wasn't embarrassing, I'm just... not proud of it," Penelope said, facing the fact that they were indeed going to have this conversation. She watched as Josie turned around to fully face her, an eyebrow raised and a look of concern on her face. Josie stayed silent making it clear that she was free to continue, but she still wouldn't quite look at Josie.

"Remember when you tried out for cheer?" Penelope asked, "Day after that talent show thing you won?"

Josie nodded and Penelope continued, her voice hesitant.

"Well, two of the girls you beat out to win that talent show, Dana and Sasha I think it was?" Penelope peered over at Josie for a split second before deciding she should probably just keep staring ahead, "Well they weren't very happy that you did. Beat them, I mean. I heard them talking about you and calling you names and stuff and I guess I just snapped."

"I caught up with them during lunch and cornered them in the parking lot and asked them about what said. They didn't answer me obviously, just made fun of me following after you like a lost puppy, actually, they actually made some comment about me being in love with you and I just lost it. I punched Dana and I broke her nose."

She heard Josie take a sharp intake of breath, probably remembering how Dana had come to school with a broken nose the next day and called it some accident from her bike. Clearly that had been a lie.

"I don't know what came over me. I think at this point it wasn't even about the things they had said about you, I think it was more about me being in love with you thing. I mean everybody at school was thinking it and everybody knew it but that was the first time - well only time - anybody had just openly said it. Things finally clicked in my brain and I panicked. I guess my fear translated into anger."

"I don't know why they never told anybody about it, it definitely wasn't because they were trying to get me out of trouble because we were not friends. I think they might have actually been scared of me," Penelope looked up from the floor and started staring at a tree to the side of Josie's head and it was then that Josie could see the tears welling up in Penelope's eyes.

"I spent that class after lunch in the bathroom cleaning my hand off and thinking, trying to wrap my head around everything. I didn't really handle it very well. Clearly. And I was going to tell you what I did," Penelope explained cocking her head to the side, one tear finally falling down the side of her face, "But then I saw you after school doing your tryouts and I just couldn't. I bailed."

It was a good thing that Hope had known Josie preferred her without makeup and therefore she hadn't worn any today because if she had, it would surely be wrecked.

"I went to Hope's house after school and told her," Penelope continued, ignoring her tears, not even trying to wipe them away but just letting them fall, "I mean I told her I lov-" Penelope caught herself just before it was too late, noticing the way Josie's eyes had widened when she nearly said 'love', "I told her I liked you. I didn't tell her about the Dana thing until a few days later."

Josie held her breath for about ten seconds, waiting to see if Penelope was going to add anything else or if she was done talking. When Penelope made no move to say anything else, Josie spoke up.

"Penelope-" Josie said in a soft tone, reaching over to wipe away some of the tears streaming down Penelope's cheeks, "It's okay. It's okay."

It was then that Penelope let out a shuddering sob, leading Josie to wrap her arms around Pneleope and whispering sweetly into her ear. She hadn't forgotten about how Penelope had nearly said 'love' but she could think about that later on.

Josie only started talking again once Penelope had calmed down a little, "It's okay Penelope. I mean I don't condone you going around punching Penelope in the name of defending my honor," she drawled, causing Penelope to let out a cute snort of laughter, "But I don't blame you. We all make mistakes. And I'm not scared of you. Not in the slightest."

Josie let Penelope cuddle into her side and rest her head on her shoulder. Josie just placed a kiss on the top of Penelope's head.

"You know I got things wrong too?" Josie said casually, "If you and Hope hadn't told me you had feelings for me, I doubt we would have even gotten to this point."

"Hope did what now!?" Penelope yelled, her eyes widening in shock and confusion and possibly mild amusement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be continued...
> 
> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it :)
> 
> Let me know what you thought about Penelope's moment!


	20. There is a lot I have to catch you up on

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josie and Penelope dance around certain things that they hadn't quite told each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This will be the second last chapter :)

"You know I got things wrong too?" Josie said casually, "If you and Hope hadn't told me you had feelings for me, I doubt we would have even gotten to this point."

"Hope did what now!?" Penelope yelled, her eyes widening in shock and confusion and possibly mild amusement.

Josie looked down at the floor, only now realizing that Penelope probably hadn't known that, especially considering that Penelope had called her only a few minutes after Hope and had told her the exact same information. But if Hope wanted it kept a secret then she should have told her because not telling Penelope about their call really hadn't been the first thing on her mind at the time.

"Well that certainly wasn't part of the mission," Penelope mumbled into the silence.

This time it was Josie's eyes that widened, "Mission?" She questioned suspiciously, "What mission?"

And just as Josie realized she wasn't supposed to reveal the fact that Hope had told her about Penelope's feelings, Penelope remembered that telling Josie about their little 'mission' was not part of the mission.

"What mission?" Josie repeated when Penelope made it clear she was not going to say a word.

"So you were saying about Hope?" Penelope deflected.

"I asked you a question," Josie said smirking, pointing an accusatory finger at Penelope, "What mission did you and Hope have going on?"

"And I asked you a question first," Penelope pointed out, raising an eyebrow in defense.

Josie huffed in annoyance before fixing Penelope with a look, "Okay fine, what was you're question again?" Josie asked.

"What did you mean when you said that Hope told you about my feelings for you?"

"Well, actually I said you and Hope told me," Josie said raising her eyebrows in deflection of the question.

"Not the point," Penelope said with a scoff.

"Right. Right. Okay well, it's rather simple. After I arrived in Belgium, Hope called me. Well no, actually she called me after I left you guys and about 20 times at the airport, and left me about a hundred messaged to which I did not respond to so she messaged Lizzie. Not me," Josie rushed out, realizing she was rambling but figured it didn't really matter.

"Well anyways," Josie said, trying to get back to the point, "Hope called me and asked me why I hadn't asked you out which is what I was supposed to do before leaving to go to Belgium," she explained, using wild hand gestures that certainly weren't necessary to get the point across but she used anyway, "and I said I was scared that you wouldn't say yes and I went off on this whole tangent and then-"

"Why were you scared I wouldn't say yes?" Penelope butted in, a confused expression strewn across her face.

Josie looked a little surprised at Penelope's interruption because she thought that she had already made that point clear but she explained anyways, "well I didn't know you liked me that way did I?" Josie pointed out.

"You mean to say that you had no clue?" Penelope asked with her eyebrows raised in surprise and amusement.

"No need to be so smug," she playfully slapping Penelope's arm, "I mean... well... did you know that I liked you?" Josie's voice was hesitant but she still wanted to know the answer.

"That's part of a bigger conversation Jojo," Penelope said, offering Josie a grin as she was referring to their 'mission', "And this is your story, not mine."

"Oh yeah," Josie said, remembering herself, "Well Hope called me, and then when I went off of that whole tangent, she must have gotten fed up with me because she just blurted out the fact that you liked me too."

"I'm going to kill her," Penelope whispered under her breath, her eyes narrowing.

"I thought she told you about it," Josie said raising her hands in surrender, giggling lightly about how much Penelope resembled an angry bunny.

"Well, at least she didn't tell you that I-" Penelope cut herself off the instant she realized what she was saying. She had nearly said _at least she didn't tell you that I love you._

"Tell me what?" Josie asked, now turning around to face Penelope properly. She could have sworn Penelope had nearly said... had nearly said _that_.

"Not important, you wanted to know about the mission right?" Penelope asked, desperately trying to deflect the question, the vulnerability wasn't exactly her strong suit, even when Josie was involved. Especially when Josie was involved, "Well Hope, Lizzie, Maya and I all-"

"Penelope," Josie said, cutting her off and fixing her with a look. It wasn't a stern look but it was more than a look of mild curiosity. Realistically, Pneleope never stood a chance when Josie looked at her like that. Nobody would. 

Really nobody could blame Penelope for what she said next. it wasn't her fault Josie tore down all of her defenses like she was tearing a receipt.

"At least she didn't say that... that..." Penelope paused for breath, not having the strength to look in Josie's eyes, "that I love you."

"I love you," Penelope repeated.

Realistically, Penelope had no idea why exactly she was this terrified, she knew that Josie loved her back. Well, at least that's what Hope, Lizzie, and Maya had said. And if Josie looked at Penelope anywhere close to the way that Penelope looked at Josie which she thought she might, then Josie certainly loved her.

Either way, knowing it and putting herself out there not knowing whether or not Josie would return the gesture was certainly frightening. She figured now that despite Hope having already told Josie about her feelings, it must have made things easier to hear it from her.

Josie just savored the moment. Savored the way that Penelope's eyes continuously flickered between the floor, the tree behind where she herself sat and the crook of Josie's neck, not quite gaining the strength to look her in the eye. Josie savored the light blush coating Penelope's cheeks and savored how vulnerable the raven-haired girl was being. Penelope might be very touchy and talkative, but she was rarely vulnerable.

Josie hadn't realized that she had leaned forward until she had done so. She didn't realize that her hand was cupping the side of Penelope's face until she was using it to forcing Penelope to fully face her. She hadn't realized that her eyes had fluttered closed until all she saw was black. And she hadn't realized that her lips had connected with Penelope's until her breath hitched in her throat.

Josie tried her very best to pour the depth of her feeling into the kiss. She would have just openly said 'I love you' back but now that she was tugging on Penelope's bottom lip, that wasn't really an option.

Josie tried her very best to show everything she was feeling. Love. Affection. All of it. And Penelope could tell. Penelope knew that was Josie was doing, but it was nothing, _nothing_ , compared to when Josie pulled back from the kiss and said those words.

I.

Love.

You.

Too.

Nothing could ever compare to that. Penelope felt like she was floating. She felt like she was flying. She felt like Josie had taken her to a high that she would never come down from.

__

They lay there, staring up at the now star-filled sky, Penelope's head resting on Josie's stomach, just lying in a comfortable silence until Josie decided to break it.

"So about that mission..." Josie started.

"Ughhh," Penelope groaned, "I thought you had forgotten."

"Nope," Josie said with a light pop on the 'p'.

"Okay, well, the official name of the mission was getting _Josie to stop being a dumbass_ ," Josie looked at her indignantly and Penelope just giggled, "I didn't come up with the name, Lizzie did."

Penelope went on to explain their little mission and while some points had Josie rolling over in laughter, and others had her attempting to glare up at Penelope. But really she did find it really funny, as soon as she got over the bit about all of them practically forcing the pair of them into a relationship. Josie also desperately tried to deny the fact that she had been jealous over her dancing with Ethan in spring. That argument - well not really an argument - lasted all the way back to town. 

Penelope spent the whole drive teasing Josie about it because she had found it adorable. Josie on the other hand did not but that was to be expected, wasn't it? She put up with it though just because she could see the smile that it put on Penelope's face.

Josie drove Penelope back to Hope's place - because Hope had demanded to be given a play by play of the date that night - and Josie even walked Penelope up to the door, giving her a kiss on the cheek.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked it. Let me know what you thought!


	21. The more things change, the more things stay the same

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And the final chapter, sorry for the wait, hopefully, it's a good close to the story.

Josie often forgets that she and Penelope were now actually in a relationship because to be quite frank, not much had changed. They still exchanged the same longing gazes and the same tender touches. But now the longing gazes weren't hidden, they wore them out in the open and didn't care much if the other caught them, and on top of that, Josie now knew the intention behind the way that Penelope would play with her hair or stroke her arm. And just the knowledge made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.

Penelope tended to forget too. They still stayed over at each other's houses and she still slept in the same bed as Josie. On these nights and their hands would still be intertwined as the two fell asleep while the others - Hope, Maya, and Lizzie - would switch between doting on the couple and teasing them or maybe even a combination of them all.

On multiple occasions, after Josie and Penelope had fallen asleep, Josie would inch towards Penelope and they would end up cuddling late into the night, Penelope as a little spoon of course. Every time they would always make fun of Penelope for this in the morning while she would adamantly claim that she was never a little spoon. So the third time this happened, Lizzie took a photo.

To say that Penelope blushed upon seeing it would be an understatement.

That photo would haunt Penelope until the end of her days.

Lizzie had taken to printing it out and sticking it up around Penelope's house whenever she came over, much to Hope, Maya, and even Josie's delight. 

Lizzie also tended to demand things from Penelope now, telling her that she would post the photo if Penelope didn't do something like help her with her homework or go grab her water. It was such a Lizzie thing to do.

Penelope was bordering on becoming Lizzie's personal butler at one point before Josie finally put a stop to it, taking pity on Penelope.

As annoying as all of it was, with all their friends taunting and teasing them, it really just showed Josie and Penelope how much they cared. Lizzie and Hope especially had probably put more effort into their relationship than they had done themselves.

Penelope remembered Hope grilling her on every detail of their first date and staying up till 3 am with her until she finished her whole story. Josie had done the same thing with Lizzie who - unlike Hope - hadn't stayed up and waited for her to arrive home and had instead demanded that she be woken up upon Josie's return home.

_Penelope had been quite successfully pretending that her legs hadn't turned to jelly when Josie had kissed her goodbye on the cheek just by Hope's front door until she heard a giggle through said front door._

_Hope stepped out and it was clear that she was barely managing to restrain her laughter. In any other situation, Hope would most certainly have made fun of Penelope for that but she had far more important matters to attend to._

_She needed to know about the date._

_Hope stepped aside, allowing Penelope to walk in. They never said it out loud but they had both silently agreed to never discuss that again._

_When they both sat down on Hope's bed, Penelope launched into the story. She spared no detail. Actually, she did spare a few. She left out their conversation of Josie's 'moment' but other than that, she spared no detail._

_She talked about their car ride and the message that Lizzie had sent her, she told Hope about how amazing the clearing they sat in was and how she had kissed Josie mere moments after they had found it, she told Hope about their conversation about her punching Dana and how much of a non-issue it was for Josie._

_"Oh wait!" Penelope said, suddenly remembering, "I almost forgot!"_

_"What?" Hope questioned curiously but turned anxious when Peneoperoundded on her and poked an accusatory finger into her chest._

_"I can't believe you didn't tell me that Josie already knew!" Penelope said, wide-eyed._

_Hope's jaw went slack as she too remembered. She froze for a few seconds and averted her gaze from the ravenette, "I didn't think you'd find out about that..." Hope trailed off sheepishly._

_"You didn't think I'd find out?" Penelope repeated, disbelievingly. She stood up, still pointing at Hope and continued, "Of course I'd find out! Did you think that Josie and I would just never discuss the whole thing?"_

_"Well I mean I didn't think it would come up in conversation on the first date," Hope mumbled. Penelope let out a bark of laughter but it wasn't humorless, it was genuine. At that was when Hope realized that Penelope wasn't actually mad at her and she let herself laugh along too._

_Once the laughter had died out, Penelope spoke up again, "Josie knows about the mission now by the way, so expect her to come marching in here tomorrow and yelling at you about it."_

_Hope groaned into the palm of her hand hat was currently covering half of her face, "Did you **have** to tell her about that?" Hope questioned exasperatedly, "It was literally your first date!" she exclaimed, "How am I the one having to deal with the reproductions?"_

_"Lizzie's probably going to get the bulk of it," Penelope said with a shrug, "She'll probably have cooled off a little but he time she comes here."_

_"Knowing Lizzie, she'll probably just palm the entire opposition off on me," Hope pointed out._

Needless to say that Josie had stormed into Hope's house the following afternoon and had yelled at her about it. But whenever Josie yelled it really wasn't very scary, she just looked like an angry bunny and it was over in seconds.

__

Apparently, more people at school had taken note of how Penelope and Josie felt about each other than they all realized because when they started walking to school hand in hand, nobody seemed to bat an eyelid.

Rafael even pulled Josie aside to give her his approval of Penelope. Well, at least the best he could considering that he had been in love with Josie.

Caroline had invited her over for dinner more than once which was normal for them but these were the fancy, family dinners. They were **special**.

More often than not, Penelope and Josie just tended to go for a walk or something rather than go on an all-out date. After one of Caroline's dinners, they would just take a walk around the block, stopping more times than they cared to admit when the other had been distracting them. 

Josie tended to message Penelope whenever she was bored and Penelope would show up at her door in minutes. If Penelope had been doing something beforehand, she would just bring it with her to Josie's. Their system worked quite well.

The only downside was that Lizzie often barged into Josie's room, ruining whatever moment they had been having by making fake-gagging noises. But that was kind of Lizzie's purpose in life right? To annoy the hell out of the pair of them?

In all honesty, they wouldn't have gotten where they were without Lizzie's meddling, they probably wouldn't have even got close. The fear of rejection had already weighed down so heavily on Josie that she inevitably would have driven herself crazy trying not to feel the way she felt about Penelope if it hadn't been for Lizzie.

But Alas, there they were, lying on Josie's bed, with Penelope trying to explain some complex math problem to the brunette who was not even trying to pay the slightest bit of attention. Instead, her eyes were trained on the side of Penelope's face. In Josie's opinion, that was a much more interesting sight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, I hope you liked this fic!
> 
> Let me know what you thought :)  
> __
> 
> Follow me on twitter if you wanna @minweasel_id


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